TIEA5 Thesis Course Session 3b. Literature Survey: Literature Search and Literature Review The Literature Search.

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1 TIEA5 Thesis Course Session 3b Overview Literature Search References and Citations Original slides by Peter Thanisch - Used at the course by Jyrki Nummenmaa The Literature Search Literature Survey: Literature Search and Literature Review (Dawson, page 92). See PDF on the course website (Session 06) for further discussion. The Literature Review Next few slides are an amalgam synthesisied from the following sources The Web document The Literature Review: A Few Tips on Conducting It by Dena Taylor, University of Toronto A literature review video, presented by Professor Lisa Dierker of the Wesleyan University, on youtube: The sound quality is very poor! This section is based on the presentations of Serge Demeyer of the University of Antwerp: Purpose of the Literature Review (1) A literature review is an examination of the body of work that has been written about your thesis topic. Your purpose in writing the literature review is to convince your reader that you understand the knowledge and ideas which have been established on a topic, and what their strengths and weaknesses are. It will help you to understand the state of knowledge concerning that thesis topic. You need to become acquainted with the methodologies, theories or models what researchers have already applied to your research question. 1

2 Purpose of the Literature Review (2) Purpose of the Literature Review (3) It may also help you narrow, expand, focus, modify or otherwise refine the research question in your thesis. Hopefully, it may help you to identify an area where no work has been done and where you may be able to be original. The research in your thesis will be introduced through your literature review and your examiners will interpret your results within the same context. In order to receive a good mark, you must avoid writing your literature review as a descriptive list of the material available, or as a set of summaries. As a piece of writing, the literature review must be defined by a guiding concept: your research objective or the problem or issue you are discussing. Skills which you must demonstrate in your literature survey 1. Information seeking: The ability to scan the literature efficiently, using manual or computerized methods, to identify a set of useful articles and books 2. Critical appraisal: The ability to apply principles of analysis to identify unbiased and valid studies. Sources of Scientific Literature Primary: Journal articles reporting study results. Secondary: Textbooks, Handbooks, Magazines, etc. Problems with reliance on secondary sources: They may describe or interpret results incorrectly. They often leave you unaware of what methods were used or what assumptions were made. They often based on the author s opinions When reading the literature, please remember these points Publish or Perish The career prospects of a university academic depend largely on the academic s publication record. It often happens that academics submit for publication a manuscript which describes a minimal incremental advance. The academic hopes to get more than one publication out of an idea. How do you know that a source is a Primary Source? Primary source articles tend to have the following structure: Title and Abstract Introduction Methods Results Discussion Reference List 2

3 Follow the citation trail Index search Identifying and reading articles Using the reference list from key articles Searching for newer articles that have cited the key articles. Read some of them. They will cite further articles. It is unlikely that you will have to use more than twenty primary source articles. Most of you will only use considerably less that twenty. A literature review must... be organized around and related directly to the thesis or research question you are developing synthesize results into a summary of what is and is not known identify areas of controversy in the literature formulate questions that need further research Whilst conducting your literature review, ask yourself questions like these: (1) What is the specific thesis, problem, or research question that my literature review helps to define? What type of literature review am I conducting? Am I looking at issues of theory? methodology? policy? quantitative research (e.g. on the effectiveness of a new procedure)? qualitative research (e.g., studies )? Whilst conducting your literature review, ask yourself questions like these: (2) What is the scope of my literature review? What types of publications am I using (e.g., journals, books, government documents, popular media)? What discipline am I working in (computer science, management science etc.)? How good was my information seeking? Has my search been wide enough to ensure I've found all the relevant material? Has it been narrow enough to exclude irrelevant material? Is the number of sources I've used appropriate for the length of my thesis? Whilst conducting your literature review, ask yourself questions like these: (3) Have I critically analysed the literature that I use? Do I follow through a set of concepts and questions, comparing items to each other in the ways they deal with them? Instead of just listing and summarizing items, do I assess them, discussing strengths and weaknesses? Have I cited and discussed studies contrary to my perspective? Will the reader find my literature review relevant, appropriate, and useful? yourself these questions. (1) Has the author formulated a problem/issue? Is it clearly defined? Is its significance (scope, severity, relevance) clearly established? Could the problem have been approached more effectively from another perspective? What is the author's research orientation (e.g., interpretive, critical science, combination)? What is the relationship between the theoretical and research perspectives? 3

4 yourself the following questions. (2) Has the author evaluated the literature relevant to the problem/issue? Does the author include literature taking positions she or he does not agree with? In a research study, How good are the basic components of the study design (e.g., population, intervention, outcome)? How accurate and valid are the measurements? Is the analysis of the data accurate and relevant to the research question? Are the conclusions validly based upon the data and analysis? yourself the following questions. (3) In material written for a popular readership, does the author use appeals to emotion, one-sided examples, or rhetorically-charged language and tone? Is there an objective basis to the reasoning, or is the author merely "proving" what he or she already believes? How does the author structure the argument? Can you "deconstruct" the flow of the argument to see whether or where it breaks down logically (e.g., in establishing cause-effect relationships)? yourself the following questions. (4) In what ways does this book or article contribute to our understanding of the problem under study, and in what ways is it useful for practice? What are the strengths and limitations? How does this book or article relate to the specific thesis or question I am developing? yourself the following questions. (5) Is the author eminent in this field of research? Is the publisher reputable? For example, some publishing companies are associated with reputable universities. For a book, is it a second edition or a re-print? You can find this out by looking at the page between the title page and the start of the contents pages. More than one edition or a reprint suggest that the book might be successful. Final remarks of the University of Toronto tips on The Literature Review A literature review is a piece of discursive prose, not a list describing or summarizing one piece of literature after another. It's usually a bad sign to see every paragraph beginning with the name of a researcher. Instead, organize the literature review into sections that present themes or identify trends, including relevant theory. You are not trying to list all the material published, but to synthesize and evaluate it according to the guiding concept of your thesis or research question Literature Sources: 4

5 The Pipeline Model of Publications (from Serge Demeyer s presentation) Books Textbooks are useful as introductions Typically they are not intended for researchers The list of references in a good textbook can be a useful starting point for a literature survey. Monographs are aimed at academic researchers. The authors are often expert researchers in the field The coverage of the references can be more complete than the coverage of a typical textbook. The technical content is often easier to follow than the technical content of a journal paper. Manuals A manual can be useful for practical purposes. Typically, a manual will not have undergone an academic refereeing process. A manual is unlikely give you an insight into the research issues in a field. You will probably not cite or use a manual in your literature survey. Journals Academic journals are the primary source of information on the current thinking and research in a field. Some journal articles are surveys. These can be a useful starting point for you. Some journals only have survey papers. An example is ACM Computing Surveys Journals Impact. Taken from ISI Web of Knowledge, available through the library webpages Software Engineering Conference Acceptance Rates ( 5

6 The why, what, where, when, who and how of References and Citations (continued) Citations: when? When to cite If you discuss a paper in detail or note some particular contribution it makes, it must be cited. Claims, statements of fact and discussions of previous work should be supported by references, if not supported by your current work Do not cite to support common knowledge. Do not end every sentence with a reference Citations: Who? Who should you cite? You might be impressed by something you have read, but you must consider whether your examiners will be equally impressed. Is the author eminent in the field of research? Is the publisher academically respectable (e.g. a university press)? Using a tool such as the ISI Web of Knowledge, does the author have a good track record? Has the author s book gone through several editions and/or reprintings? Look at the page between the title page and the start of the Contents in order to discover this information. Citations: What? 6

7 What should you cite? For a journal: Is it aimed at academics or practitioners? Is it well-established? Is it peer-reviewed? For conferences and workshops: Is it an academic conference or more of a practitioners conference? Are the papers peer-reviewed? What is the acceptance rate? (The lower the better, generally speaking.) Citations: How (not) How not to cite If author A cites another author, B, and you have not read B, make this clear in your citation: Bad: According to Dawson (2010), it is possible to formulate a simple set of rules. Good: According to Zobel (2004; as quoted by Dawson, 2010), it is possible to formulate a simple set of rules. IEEE Citation Reference Books [1] J. K. Author, Title of chapter in the book, in Title of His Published Book, xth ed. City of Publisher, Country if not USA: Abbrev. of Publisher, year, ch. x, sec. x, pp. xxx xxx. NOTE: Use et al. when three or more names are given. Examples: [1] B. Klaus and P. Horn, Robot Vision. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, [2] L. Stein, Random patterns, in Computers and You, J. S. Brake, Ed. New York: Wiley, 1994, pp [3] R. L. Myer, Parametric oscillators and nonlinear materials, in Nonlinear Optics, vol. 4, P. G. Harper and B. S. Wherret, Eds. San Francisco, CA: Academic, 1977, pp [4] M. Abramowitz and I. A. Stegun, Eds., Handbook of Mathematical Functions (Applied Mathematics Series 55). Washington, DC: NBS, 1964, pp Handbooks [1] Name of Manual/Handbook, x ed., Abbrev. Name of Co., City of Co., Abbrev. State, year, pp. xx-xx. Examples [1] Transmission Systems for Communications, 3rd ed., Western Electric Co., Winston-Salem, NC, 1985, pp [2] Motorola Semiconductor Data Manual, Motorola Semiconductor Products Inc., Phoenix, AZ,

8 Technical Reports Place the name and location of the company or institution after the author and title and give the report number and date at the end of the reference. [1] J. K. Author, Title of report, Abbrev. Name of Co., City of Co., Abbrev. State, Rep. xxx, year. Example: [1] E. E. Reber et al. Oxygen absorption in the earth s atmosphere, Aerospace Corp., Los Angeles, CA, Tech. Rep. TR-0200 ( )-3, Nov Conference Technical Articles (1) The general form for citing technical articles published in conference proceedings is to list the author/s and title of the paper, followed by the name (and location, if given) of the conference publication in italics using these standard abbreviations. Write out all the remaining words, but omit most articles and prepositions like of the and on. That is, Proceedings of the 1996 Robotics and Automation Conference becomes Proc Robotics and Automation Conf. Conference Technical Articles (2) [1] J. K. Author, Title of paper, in Unabbreviated Name of Conf., City of Conf., Abbrev. State (if given), year, pp. xxx-xxx. For an electronic conference article when there are no page numbers: J. K. Author [two authors: J. K. Author and A. N. Writer ] [three or more authors: J. K. Author et al.], Title of Article, in [Title of Conf. Record as ], [copyright year] [IEEE or applicable copyright holder of the Conference Record]. doi: [DOI number] WWW [1] J. K. Author. (year, month day). Title (edition) [Type of medium]. Available: Example: [1] J. Jones. (1991, May 10). Networks (2nd ed.) [Online]. Available: Masters Theses [1] J. K. Author, Title of thesis, M.S. thesis, Abbrev. Dept., Abbrev. Univ., City of Univ., Abbrev. State, year. Examples: [1] N. Kawasaki, Parametric study of thermal and chemical nonequilibrium nozzle flow, M.S. thesis, Dept. Electron. Eng., Osaka Univ., Osaka, Japan, 1993 Ph.D. Dissertations [1] J. K. Author, Title of dissertation, Ph.D. dissertation, Abbrev. Dept., Abbrev. Univ., City of Univ., Abbrev. State, year. Examples: [1] J. O. Williams, Narrow-band analyzer, Ph.D. dissertation, Dept. Elect. Eng., Harvard Univ., Cambridge, MA,

9 Periodicals IEEE Reference style (1) [1] J. K. Author, Name of paper, Abbrev. Title of Periodical, vol. x, no. x, pp. xxx-xxx, Abbrev. Month, year. Examples: [1] R. E. Kalman, New results in linear filtering and prediction theory, J. Basic Eng., ser. D, vol. 83, pp , Mar [2] Ye. V. Lavrova, Geographic distribution of ionospheric disturbances in the F2 layer, Tr. IZMIRAN, vol. 19, no. 29, pp , 1961 (Transl.: E. R. Hope, Directorate of Scientific Information Services, Defence Research Board of Canada, Rep. T384R, Apr. 1963). NOTE: Use et al. when three or more names are given. References need not be cited in the text. When they are, they appear on the line, in square brackets, inside the punctuation. as shown by Brown [4], [5]; as mentioned earlier [2], [4] [7], [9]; Smith [4] and Brown and Jones [5]; Wood et al. [7] or as nouns: as demonstrated in [3]; according to [4] and [6] [9]. IEEE Reference Style (2) Do not use Ibid. (Latin, short for ibidem, meaning "the same place") is the term used to provide a citation or reference for a source that was cited immediately before. Op. cit. is an abbreviation of the Latin phrase opere citato, meaning "in the work cited. Instead, you repeat the citation in the text and just use the same reference. IEEE Reference Style (3) In all references, the given name of the author or editor is abbreviated to the initial only and precedes the last name. Use commas around Jr., Sr., and III in names. If there are many names, use et al. Citations and References in Microsoft Word The following URL contains details about how to create a bibliography and citations using Microsoft Word: HA aspx 9