Research Methods Literature Review Essay Example

in libraries. The terms used to describe methods in this literature review come from the works of Pickard (2007), Powell (1991), and Bush and Harter (1980). Definition, Purpose, and Scope

The Review of related literature involves the systematic identification, location, and analysis of documents containing information related to the research problem. The term is also used to describe the written component of a research plan or report that discusses the reviewed documents. These documents can include articles, abstracts, reviews, monographs, dissertations, other research reports, and electronic media. The literature review has several important purposes that make it well worth the time and effort.

The major purpose of reviewing the literature is to determine what has already been done that relates to your topic, This knowledge not only prevents you from unintentionally duplicating another person’s research, it also gives you the understanding and insight you need to place your topic within a logical frame. Put simply, the review tells you what has been done and what needs to be done. Previous studies can provide the rationale for your research hypothesis, and indications of what to be done can help you justify the significance of your study.

Another important purpose of reviewing the literature is to discover research strategies and specific data collection approaches that have or have not been productive in investigations of topics similar to yours. This information will help you avoid other researchers’ mistakes and profit from their experiences. It may suggest approaches and procedures that you previously had not considered. For example, suppose your topic involved the comparative effects of a brand-new experimental method versus the traditional method on the

achievement of eighth-grade science students.

The review of literature might reveal 10 related studies that found no differences in achievement. Several of the studies, however, might suggest that the brand-new method may be more effective for certain kinds of students than for others. Thus, you might reformulate your topic to involve the comparative effectiveness of the brand-new method versus the traditional method on the achievement of a subgroup of eighth-grade science students: those with low aptitude.

Being familiar with previous research also facilitates interpretation of your study results. The results can be discussed in terms of whether and how they agree with previous findings. If the results contradict previous findings, you can describe differences between your study and the others, providing a rationale for the discrepancy If your results are consistent with other findings, your report should include suggestions for the next step; if they are not consistent, your report should include suggestions for studies that ight resolve the conflict. Beginning researchers often have difficulty determining how broad their literature review should be. They understand that all literature directly related to their topic should be reviewed; they just don’t know when to quit! They have trouble determining which articles are “related enough” to their topic to be included. Unfortunately, there is no formula that can be applied to solve the problem; you must base your decisions on your own judgment and the advice of your teachers or advisors.

The following general guidelines, however, can assist you: • Avoid the temptation to include everything you find in your literature review, Bigger does not mean better. A smaller, well-organized review is definitely preferred to

a review containing many studies that are more or less related to the problem. • When investigating a heavily researched area, review only those works that are directly related to your specific problem. You’ll find plenty of references and should not have to rely on less-related studies.

For example, the role of feedback in learning has been extensively researched for both animals and human beings, for verbal learning and nonverbal learning, and for a variety of different learning tasks. If you were concerned with the relationship between frequency of feedback and chemistry achievement, you would probably not have to review feedback studies related to animal learning. Qualitative Research and the Review of Related Literature

Unlike quantitative researchers, who spend a great deal of time examining the research on their topic at the outset of the study, some qualitative researchers will not delve deeply into their literature until their topic has emerged over time. There is disagreement among qualitative researchers about the role of the literature review in the research process. Some qualitative researchers have argued that reviewing the literature curtails inductive analysis—using induction to determine the direction of the research—and should be avoided at the early stages of the research process.

Others suggest that the review of related literature is important early in the qualitative research process because it serves the following functions: * The literature review demonstrates the underlying assumptions (propositions) behind the research questions that are central to the research proposal. * The literature review provides a way for the novice researcher to convince the proposal the reviewers that she is knowledgeable about the related research and the “intellectual traditions”

that support the proposed study. The literature review provides the researcher with an opportunity to identify any gaps that may exist in the body of literature and to provide a rationale for how the proposed study may contribute to the existing body of knowledge. * The literature review helps the researcher to refine the research questions and embed them in guiding hypotheses that provide possible directions the researcher may follow. We recommend that qualitative researchers conduct a review of related literature but also recognize that the review serves a slightly different purpose than the one outlined for quantitative researchers.

What is a Literature Review? Novice researchers tend to approach the literature review as nothing more than a collection of summaries of papers or an elaborated annotated bibliography of multiple research manuscripts (Webster & Watson, 2002). A meaningful literature review is much more. Hart (1998) defined the literature review as “the use of ideas in the literature to justify the particular approach to the topic, the selection of methods, and demonstration that this research contributes something new” (p. 1).

He also noted that for the literature review, “quality means appropriate breadth and depth, rigor and consistency, clarity and brevity, and effective analysis and synthesis” (Hart, 1998, p. 1). J. Shaw (1995) noted that the process of the review should “explain how one piece of research builds on another” (p. 326). Webster and Watson (2002) defined an effective literature review as one that “creates a firm foundation for advancing knowledge. It facilitates theory development, closes areas where a plethora of research exists, and uncovers areas where research is needed” (p. 3). From these definitions it

is clear that an effective literature review should include the following characteristics: a) methodologically analyze and synthesize quality literature, b) provide a firm foundation to a research topic, c) provide a firm foundation to the selection of research methodology, and d) demonstrate that the proposed research contributes something new to the overall body of knowledge or advances the research field’s knowledge-base. Why Conduct a Literature Review?

Before examining how to conduct a literature review, one must first understand the place of the review in research (Webster & Watson, 2002). Thus, two questions must be answered: What is research? Why is a literature review needed for any quality research endeavour? Research is defined as an endeavour that scholars “intentionally set out to enhance [their] under- standing of a phenomenon and expect to communicate what [they] discover to the large scientific community” (Leedey & Ormond, 2005, p. 4).

Two critical considerations stem from this definition: a) research must enhance the scientific community’s current understanding of a phenomenon, or contribute to enhance the Book, and b) research must communicate what was discovered in the new study to the scientific community. Knowing the current status of the Book in the given re- search field is an essential first step for any research project (Aviary et al. , 2004). An effective literature review accomplishes this step by: 1. Helping the researcher understand the existing body of knowledge including where ex- cess research exists (i. . what is already know? ) and where new research is needed (i. e. what is needed to be known? ) 2. Providing a solid theoretical foundation for the proposed study (related to “what

is al- ready known? ”) 3. Substantiating the presence of the research problem (related to “what is needed to be known? ”) 4. Justifying the proposed study as one that contributes something new to the Book 5. Framing the valid research methodologies, approach, goals, and research questions for the proposed study the next three sub-sections address the importance of the literature review for quality IS research.

Methods used in Knowledge Organization Research :- As discussed in previous literature reviews, knowledge organization is both a conceptual as well as physical act. While research in knowledge organization theory often revolves around the way ideas or concepts linking together and the best way to represent those connections, research in the physical act of knowledge organization (through information organization)revolves around the way knowledge organization systems (KOSs) interact with and assist information systems in libraries or other information institutions.

Research methods used to study the physical manifestations of knowledge organization in information systems found in libraries and the internet seem to employ variations of experimental research and content analysis methods. Powell (1991) and Pickard (2007) have observed that the experimental research approach is rarely used successfully in library research involving human subjects. Experimental research is best performed when researching information systems where human are not involved because the cause and effect relationship between predefined variables can be controlled.

Yet, information retrieval studies can effectively use the experimental method because of the amount of control of independent variables possessed by the researcher (Pickard, 2007). One example of experimental study that uses information retrieval techniques to examine knowledge organization was conducted by Papadakos, Kyripianos, Mavropodi, and Stefan (2009). In

this study, the links between a controlled vocabulary, specifically the Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH), and ontology’s were explored in a system that housed thesis and dissertations.

While the researchers categorized this approach as a “case study”—a term used very liberally and discussed in more depth later in this literature review-- the inherently experimental design to the study is undeniable as the system was testing the effectiveness of a particular procedure and predicting the applicability of such procedures for library system users Another method that is of particular note in this section is the quasi-experimental approach. The use of experimental research design is often limited to systems research and it is recommended to avoid using human subjects when using a experimental design.

In libraries and information systems, where humans are often an essential consideration in design and implementation, the quasi-experimental research method is employed when examining the relationship between systems and humans in field-focused experiments (Powell, 1991; Pickard, 2007). A variation of the experimental research method, the quasi-experimental method allows for some experimental methods to be employed for more organizational, behavioural, or socially focused outcomes (Pickard, 2007).

The potential for quasi-experimental methods in information systems, especially as a foundation of a mixed method approach is great. Often during examination of the literature discussed here, quasi-experimental methods laid the foundation fore more in-depth application of content analysis. The content analysis method, discussed in more detail in the section above on research methods employed in studies of knowledge organization theory, is also used when evaluating the effectiveness of certain elements of KOSs used in the creation, development, enhancement, orevaluation of information systems.