REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE:

Having found a suitable topic, the beginning researcher is raring to go. Too often, the review of
related literature is seen as a necessary evil to be completed as fast as possible so that one can
get on with the “real research”. This perspective reflects a lack of understanding of the
purposes and importance of the review and a feeling of uneasiness on the part of the students
who are not sure how to report the literature. Nonetheless, the review of literature is as
important as any other component of the research process and can be conducted quite
painlessly if approached in an orderly manner.

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, books, other research reports, and electronic media 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, but it also gives you the understanding and insight you need to place your topic
within a logical framework. Previous studies can provide the rationale for your research
hypothesis, and indications of what needs to be done can help you justify the significance of
your study. Put simply, the review tells you what has been done and what needs to be done.

FUNCTIONS OF A LITERATURE REVIEW:

The following general guidelines can assist you when writing a review of literature:

1. Avoid the temptation to include everything you find in your literature review.
2. When investigating a heavily researched area, review only those works that are directly
related to your specific problem.
3. When investigating a new or little-researched problem area, review any study related in
some meaningful way to your problem.

The functions of a literature review are as under:

1. The literature review demonstrates the underlying assumptions (i.e. propositions)

behind the research questions that are central to the research proposal.
2. The literature review provides a way for the novice researcher to convince the proposal
reviewers that he/ she is knowledgeable about the related research and the intellectual
traditions that support the proposed study.
 3. 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.
4. 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.

CONDUCTING A LITERATURE REVIEW:

Conducting a literature review follows a basic set of steps for both quantitative and qualitative
research.

STEP 01 Identifying Keywords:

Make a list of keywords to guide your literature search. Most of the initial source works you
consult will have alphabetical subject indexes to help you locate information about your topic.
You can look in these indexes for the keywords you have selected. Usually, the keywords will be
obvious,; sometimes you may have to play detective. Giving a bit of though to possible
keywords should facilitate an efficient beginning to a task that requires organization, and in
looking at initial sources, you may identify additional keywords that will help you find
succeeding sources.

STEP 02 Identifying Your Sources:

For your review, you will examine a range of sources that are pertinent to your topic. To start, it
is best to consult educational encyclopedias, handbooks, and annual reviews found in libraries.
They allow you to get a picture of your topic in the broader context and help you understand
where it fits in the field.

It is important to distinguish between two types of sources used by educational researchers:

primary and secondary sources. A secondary source is secondhand information, such as a
brief description of a study written by someone other than the person who conducted it. For
example, abstract, the Review of Educational Research (summarizes many research studies
given conducted on a given topic). Research summaries reported in textbooks, magazines,
and newspapers are considered secondary sources. They typically provide global descriptions
of results with few details on the methodology. They are accounts written after the fact with
the benefit of hindsight. 

They are interpretations and evaluations of primary sources. Secondary sources are not
evidence, but rather commentary on and discussion of evidence.
Examples include:
 Bibliographies (also considered tertiary); 
 Biographical works;
 Commentaries, criticisms;
 Dictionaries, Encyclopedias (also considered tertiary);
 Histories; 
 Literary criticism such as Journal articles; 
 Magazine and newspaper articles; 
 Monographs, other than fiction and autobiography;
 Textbooks (also considered tertiary);
 Web site (also considered primary).

A primary source contains firsthand information, such as an original document or a

description of a study written by the person who conducted it. Primary sources are original
materials on which other research is based. They are from the time period
involved and have not been filtered through interpretation or evaluation. They are usually
the first formal appearance of results in physical, print or electronic format. They present
original thinking, report a discovery, or share new information.
Examples include:
 Literary creation: novels, short stories, poems, etc. 

 Artifacts (e.g. coins, plant specimens, fossils, furniture, tools, clothing, all from the
time under study); 
 Audio recordings (e.g. radio programs) 
 Diaries; 
 Internet communications on email, listservs; 
 Interviews (e.g., oral histories, telephone, e-mail);
 Journal articles published in peer-reviewed publications; 
 Letters; 
 Newspaper articles written at the time; 
 Original Documents (i.e. birth certificate, will, marriage license, trial transcript);
 Patents;
 Photographs 
 Proceedings of Meetings, conferences and symposia;
 Records of organizations, government agencies (e.g. annual report, treaty,
constitution, government document); 
 Speeches; 
 Survey Research (e.g., market surveys, public opinion polls);
 Video recordings (e.g. television programs);
 Works of art, architecture, literature, and music (e.g., paintings, sculptures, musical
scores, buildings, novels, poems). 
 Web site.
Searching for Books on Your Topic in the Library:
Since you have already identified your keywords and some potential resources, head straight to
the university library because this will serve as a first stop for you in collecting your relevant
literature. You should learn about the references available and their location as well. Moat
university libraries provide help and education in the use of their resources, and also outline
the rules and regulations regarding the use of library materials.

In most of the cases, you find a librarian on duty that is willing to help you out for your
searches. However, you should be able to navigate on your own through the library. You must
be able to use the library catalogues and browse the stacks to search the books related to your
topic.

Using Library Catalogs:

In nearly all libraries, the card catalogues of previous generation have been replaced with
computer terminals that provide access to the resources in the library. These electronic
catalogs are extremely user friendly and give you a good place to start your search for literature
related to your focus’ area. In order to locate primary or secondary sources, you need to
conduct a search of the library catalog. By typing a title, or an author name, you will quickly
learn about the item’s availability and its location. If you are unaware of the title and author,
continue the search via the use of subject or keyword. For example, to find summaries of
research previously conducted in an area of psychology, you may enter the keywords handbook
and psychology.

If you are at the beginning of your search for primary sources, you should conduct a keyword
search. A keyword search may be narrow or broad- how narrow or broad depends on factors
such as the purpose of the search and the amount of material available on your topic. If you
need a relatively small number of references and if much has been published about your topic,
a narrow search will be appropriate. If you need a relatively large number of references and
very little has been published about your topic, a broad search will be better. If you do not have
a sense of what is available, your best strategy is to start narrow and broaden as necessary. For
example, if you find very few references related to the effect of interactive multimedia on the
achievement of 10th-grade biology students, you can broaden your search by including all
sciences or all secondary students.

A useful way to narrow or broaden a search is to use Boolean operators, words that tell the
computer the keywords you want your search results to include or exclude. Common Boolean
operators are the words AND, OR and NOT (usually typed in capital letters). Put simply, using
the connector AND and NOT between keywords narrows a search, whereas using the connector
OR broadens it. By using various combinations of OR and AND connectors, you can vary your
search strategy as needed.
Browsing the Stacks:

With access to the electronic catalogs, many students may not consider an older strategy for
locating books: browsing the stacks. If you can locate the area related to your area of focus, it
can be productive to browse and pull interesting books off the shelves. You may also find the
related materials which were not uncovered in your electronic search by looking at the
reference list of a book selected from the shelf.

Consulting Computer Databases to Locate Journals, Articles, Reports, and Other Publications:

The electronic catalog found in a library is an example of a database, a sort-able, analyzable

collection of units of information maintained on a computer. Other types of databases are also
used in research. Available online, some are topic-specific indexes, some are collections of
abstracts, and some-full text databases-are compilations of articles or other documents.
Available at most university libraries, computer databases provide an excellent way to identify
primary sources. The following are some of the most commonly used databases for searches of
education literature:

1. Education Resources Information Center (ERIC)

2. Education Index
3. PsycINFO
4. Dissertation Abstracts
5. Readers’ Guide to Periodical Literature
6. Annual Review of Psychology

Searching the Internet and the World Wide Web:

The Internet and the World Wide Web provide information and resources on many educational
topics. The World Wide Web is a service on the internet that gives users access to text, graphics
and multimedia. You can access the Web using an internet connection and a browser. The
resources available online are limitless, we can access educational journals that provide full-text
articles, bibliographic information, and abstracts with the click of a mouse. The best way to
become adept at searching is simply by surfing in your spare time. Following are the websites
that are especially useful to educational researchers. In addition, you can gain access to other
electronic indexing and abstracting sources by using a search engine to find your own
addresses. Addresses containing ed or ending at .edu are related to educational enterprises,
those ending in .com are related to commercial enterprises, those ending in .org refer to
organizations (including professional organizations), and those ending in .gov link to
government sites. Following are some websites that are especially useful to educational
researchers:
 i. UnCover Periodical Index ( http://www.unm.edu/~brosen/uncover.htm )
ii. NewJour ( http://gort.ucsd.edu/newjour/ )
iii. Education Week ( http://www.eduweek.org/ )
iv. Journal of Statistics Education ( http://www.amstat.org/publications/jse/ )
v. CSTEEP ( http://www.csteep.bc.edu/ )
vi. National Centre for Education Statistics ( http://www.nces.edu.gov )
vii. Developing Educational Standards ( http://www.edstandards.org/Standards.html )
viii. International Resources for Special Education ( http://specialed.miningco.com )
ix. U.S. Department of Education ( http://www.ed.gov/ )

Becoming a Member of Professional Organizations:

Another way to find current literature related to your research topic is through membership in
professional organizations. The following list contains a few names of U.S. based professional
organizations that serve as valuable resources for research reports and curriculum materials.
Similar organizations can be found in other countries:

i. ASCD: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development( http://www.ascd.org/)

ii. NCTM: National Council of Teachers of Mathematics ( http://www.nctm.org/ )
iii. NCSS: National Council for the Social Studies ( http://www.ncss.org )
iv. NSTA: National Science Teachers Association ( http://nsta.org/ )
v. IRA: International Reading Association ( http://www.reading.org/ )

STEP 04 EVALUATING YOUR SOURCES:

When you have a source in hand, you will need to evaluate it. Critically evaluating your sources
will save you time and energy reading and abstracting sources that may contribute little to your
understanding of a research topic.

QUESTIONS TO EVALUATE LITERATURE SOURCES CRITICALLY

1. What was the problem statement of the study? (applies to research topic)
2. Who was studied? (sample, population, related to research)
3. Where was the source published (which journal, authenticity)
4. When was the research conducted? (date of publication, copyright dates, date of
publishing research papers)
5. How was the study conducted? (subjective and impartial)

STEP 05 ABSTRACTING:
After the primary references related to your topic are identified, move on to the next phase of
the review of literature—abstracting. An abstract is a summary of a study that describes its
hypothesis, procedures, and conclusions. Basically, abstracting involves reviewing,
summarizing, and classifying your references. You might wonder why you need to write another
abstract while the given article already contains one. There are two reasons for this, the first
being that a provided abstract is not necessarily “perfectly good”. It may not me an accurate or
complete summary of the contents of the article. Secondly, a great deal of important
information can be obtained only by reading the complete article.

To begin the abstracting process, arrange your articles and other sources in reverse
chronological order. Beginning with the latest reference is good research strategy because the
most recent research is likely to have profited from previous research. Also recent articles may
cite preceding studies you may not have identified. For each reference, complete the following
steps:

a. If the article has an abstract or summary, which most do, read it to determine the
relevance of the article to your problem.
b. Skim the entire article, making mental notes of the main points of the study.
c. On an index card or in a computer write a complete bibliographic reference for the
work. This step can be tedious but is important. You will spend much more time trying
to find the complete bibliographic information for an article or book you failed to
abstract completely than you will be abstracting it in the first place. If you are aware of a
particular editorial style must be followed in your research report e.g. the one described
in the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (APA), put your
biblical reference in that form.
A style manual provides reference formats for all types of sources. Whatever format you
use, use it consistently and be certain your bibliographic references are accurate. You
never know when you may have to go back and get additional information from an
article.
d. Classify and code the article according to some system, and then add the code to the
database entry or index card (or a photocopy) in a conspicuous place, such as an upper
corner. The code should be one that can be easily accessed when you want to sort your
notes into the categories you devise. You may use abbreviations to quote variables
relevant to your study (e.g., “SA” on the upper corner of your abstract may signify that
the article is about student achievement). Coding and keeping track of articles is the key
for organization. Useful computer programs simplify coding and subsequent retrieval
are HyperRESEARCH and EndNote.
e. Abstract or summarize, the reference (i.e. source works) by typing or neatly writing
(you’re going to have to read your abstracts later) is essential points. If the work is an
 opinion article, write the main points of the author’s position. If it is a study, state the
problem, the procedures (including a description of participants and instruments), and
the major conclusions. Make special note of any particularly interesting or unique
aspect of the study, such as use of a new measuring instrument. Double-check the
reference to make sure you have not omitted any pertinent information. If an abstract
provided at the beginning of an article contains all the essential information (and that is
a big if), by all means use it.
f. Indicate any thoughts that come to your mind, such as points on which you disagree
(e.g., mark them with an X) or components that you do not understand (e.g., mark with
a “?”). For example, if an author stated that he or she had used a double-blind
procedure and you were unfamiliar with that technique, you can put a question mark
next to that statement in your database entry, on your index card, or on a photocopy of
the page. Later, you can find out what it is.
g. Indicate any statements that are direct quotations or personal reactions. Plagiarism,
intentional or not, is an absolute no-no, with the direst of consequences. If you do not
put quotation marks around direct quotations on your card or database entry, for
example, you may not remember later which statements are and which are not direct
quotations. You must also record the page number of the quotation in case you use it
later in your paper. You will need the page number when citing the source in your
paper. Direct quotations should be kept to a minimum in your research plan and report;
both should be in your words, not those of other researchers. Occasionally, a direct
quotation may be quite appropriate and useful.
Whatever approach you use, guard your notes carefully. Make a copy and put it away in
a safe place. When you have complete your reviewing task, those notes will represent
many hours of work. Students have been brought to tears because they have forgot
their notes on the bus, or on a table in the cafeteria. Beyond being sympathetic, your
instructor can do little more than to tell you to start over (ouch!). Also, when the
research report is completed, the cards or computer information can be filed (or
photocopies can be placed in notebooks) and saved for future reference and future
studies.

Literature Matrix:

A helpful way to keep track of your abstracts is to record them, by author and date, on a matrix.
The matrix is a powerful organizer when you are committing your thoughts to text. Along the Y-
axis list the authors’ names and year of publication. Along the X-axis list the kinds of
variables/themes/ issues addressed by the studies. The matrix will provide you with a mental
map of what you are reading and what the studies share in common.
Author/s Year Variables Considered in the Study

STEP 06 ANALYZING, ORGANIZING AND REPORTING THE LITERATURE REVIEW:

For beginning researchers, the hardest part of writing a literature review for a plan or report is
thinking about how hard it is going to be to write the literature review. More time is spent over
worrying about doing it than actually doing it. This hesitancy stems mostly from a lack of
experience with the type of writing needed in a literature review which requires a technical
form of writing unlike most of the writing we do. In technical writing, facts must be
documented and opinions substantiated. For example, if you say that the high school dropout
percentage in Ohio has increased in the last 10 years, you must provide a source for this
information. Technical writing is precise, requiring clarity of definitions and consistency in the
use of terms. If the term achievement is important in your review, you must indicate what you
mean by it and be consistent in using the meaning throughout the written review. The given
table summarizes these and other important technical writing guidelines useful in a literature
review.

Guidelines for Technical Writing

a. Document facts and substantiate opinions: Cite references to support your facts
and opinions. Note that facts are usually based on empirical data, whereas
opinions are not. In the hierarchy of persuasiveness, facts are more persuasive
than opinions. Differentiate between facts and opinions in the review.
b. Define terms clearly, and be consistent in your use of terms.
c. Organize content logically.
d. Direct your writing to a particular audience. Usually the literature review is
aimed at a relatively naïve reader, one who has some basic understanding of the
topic but requires education to understand the topic or issue. Do not assume
your audience knows as much as you do about the topic and literature. They
don’t, so you have to write to educate them.
e. Follow an accepted manual of style. The manual indicates the style in which
chapter headings are setup, how tables must be constructed, how footnotes and
bibliographies may be prepared, and the like. Commonly used manuals and their
current editions are Publication Manual of the American Psychological
Association, Fifth Edition, and The Chicago Manual of Style, Fifteenth Edition.
f. Evade effective verbiage and eschew obscuration of the obvious. In other words,
 limit bog words and avoid jargon.
g. Start each major section with a brief overview of the section. The overview may
begin like this: “In this section, three main issues are examined. The first is…”
h. End each major section with a summary of the main ideas.

If one has efficiently abstracted the literature related to your problem, and approach the task
equally systematically, then analyzing, organizing and reporting the literature will be relatively
painless. To get warmed up, read quickly through your notes to refresh your memory and help
you identify references that no longer seem related to your research. Do not force references
into your review, that do not really fit; the review forms the background and rationale for your
hypothesis\ and should contain only references that serve this purpose. The following
guidelines should be helpful to you:

I. MAKE AN OUTLINE: An outline will save your time and effort in the longer
run and increase your probability of having an organized review. The outline should not
be necessarily detailed. Begin by identifying the main topics and the order in which they
should be presented. For example, the outline of the review for the problem concerned
with salaried professionals versus parent volunteers may begin with these headings:
“Literature on Salaried Professionals:, “Literature on Parent Volunteers:, and “Literature
Comparing the Two”. You can always add or remove topics in the outline as your work
progresses. The next step is to differentiate each major heading into logical
subheadings. In our outline for this chapter, for example, the section “Review of Related
Literature” was subdivided as follows:

1) Review of Related Literature

2) Definition, Purpose and Scope
3) Qualitative Research and the Review of Literature
4) Identifying Keywords
5) Identifying Your Sources
6) Evaluating Your Sources
7) Abstracting
8) Analyzing, Organizing, and Reporting the Literature

The need for further differentiation will be determined by your topic; the more
complex it is, the more subheadings you will require. When you have completed
your outline, you will need to invariably rearrange, add and delete topics.
However, it is much easier to reorganize an outline rather than a document
written in paragraph form.
II. ANALYZE EACH REFERENCE IN TERMS OF YOUR OUTLINE: In other words,
determine the subheading under which each reference fits. Then sort your references
into appropriate files. If you end up references without a home, there are three logical
possibilities: (1) something is wrong with your outline, (2) the references do not belong
in your review but do belong somewhere else in your research plan and report
introduction. Opinion articles or reports of descriptive research often are useful in the
introduction, whereas formal research studies are most useful in the review of related
literature.
III. ANALYZE THE REFERENCES UNDER EACH SUBHEADING FOR SIMILARITIES AND
DIFFERENCES: If three references say essentially the same thing, you
will not need to describe each one; it is much better to make one summary statement
and cite the three sources, as in this example:

Several studies have found white chalk to be more effective than yellow chalk in the
teaching of advanced mathematics.

IV. GIVE A MEANINGFUL OVERVIEW OF PAST RESEARCH: Don’t present a series of

abstracts or a mere list of findings (Jones found A, Smith found B, and Brown found C).
Your task is to organize and summarize the references in a meaningful way. Do not
ignore studies that are contradictory to most other studies or to your personal bias.
Analyze and evaluate contradictory studies and try to determine a possible explanation.
For example,

Contrary to these studies is the work of Rottenstudee (1998). Who found yellow chalk to
be more effective than white chalk, in the teaching of trigonometry. However, the size of
the treatment groups (two students per group) and the situation (one class period) may
have seriously affected the results.

V. DISCUSS THE REFERENCES LEAST RELATED TO YOUR PROBLEM FIRST AND THOSE MOST
RELATED TO YOUR PROBLEM JUST PRIOR IN THE STATEMENT OF THE HYPOTHESIS:
Think of a big V. At the bottom of the V is your hypothesis directly above you’re your
hypothesis are the studies most directly related to it, and so forth. The idea is to
organize and present the literature in such a way that it leads logically to a tentative,
testable conclusion, namely, your hypothesis. Highlight or summarize important aspects
of the review to help readers identify them. If your problem has more than one major
aspect, you may have two Vs or one V that logically leads to two tentative, testable
conclusions.
 VI. CONCLUDE THE REVIEW WITH A BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE LITERATURE AND ITS
IMPLICATIONS: The length of this summary depends on the length of
the review. It should be detailed enough to clearly show the chain of logic you have
followed in arriving at your implications and tentative conclusions.

In order to summarize the results of the literature, conduct a meta-analysis. A meta-analysis is

a statistical approach to summarizing the results of many quantitative studies that have
investigated basically the same problem. It provides a numerical way of expressing the
composite (i.e. “average”) result of a group of studies. It makes the review as inclusive as
possible. The key feature of meta-analysis is that the results from each study are translated into
an effect size. Effect size is a numerical way of expressing the strength or magnitude of a
reported relation.