“A literature review surveys books, scholarly articles, and any other sources relevant to a particular issue, area of research, or theory, and by so doing, provides a description, summary, and critical evaluation of these works in relation to the research problem being investigated. Literature reviews are designed to provide an overview of sources you have explored while researching a particular topic and to demonstrate to your readers how your research fits within a larger field of study…” Fink, Arlene. Conducting Research Literature Reviews: From the Internet to Paper. Fourth edition. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE, 2014.
"A literature review is an assessment of a body of research that addresses a research question. It identifies what is already known about an area of study. It may also: Identify questions a body of research does not answer; Make a case for why further study of research questions is important to a field... It is a research journey with several steps: Framing a research question; Searching relevant bodies of literature; Managing search results; Synthesizing the research literature; Writing an assessment of the literature. The process is iterative—as you gain understanding, you’ll return to earlier steps to rethink, refine, and rework your literature review..." The Literature Review: A Research Journey. Overview. Harvard Graduate School of Education, Gutman Library. http://guides.library.harvard.edu/literaturereview
Essential elements ...
The topic interests you
The topic is creative
The topic is not over broad
The prompt ...
Number of sources
Type of sources
Date range
Page limit
Citation format
Literature Review style
Narrow your focus ...
Researching college students alone is over broad.
Researching college students’ drug use is more manageable.
Researching college students’ drug use and the impact of that drug use on their academic success is getting focused.
Brainstorming ...
The process of identifying and selecting your research search terms through a creative, critical thinking based, iterative practice.
"college students" OR "university students" OR undergraduates
AND
"drug use" OR "drug abuse" OR "substance abuse" OR "substance use"
AND
“academic performance" OR "academic achievement" OR gpa OR "academic engagement" OR grades OR "academic success"
("college students" OR "university students" OR undergraduates) AND ("drug use" OR "drug abuse" OR "substance abuse" OR "substance use"). Search Limits: SCHOLARLY (PEER REVIEW ARTICLES) ONLY; DATE (2015-Present)
Some research platforms like EBSCOhost contain more than one database. In this case, EBSCOhost has over 30 search databases. [To see the 30+ databases on this EBSCOhost platform, click on the search hyperlink above. Once you get to the search result in EBSCOhost, at the top of the screen just above the search template box, click "show all" ...]
Choosing a place to search ... Where you search, and don't search, matters ...
Search platform or database selection is a key part of the research process - Where you search matters.
What you know or don't know about your research topic determines where you begin
If you understand the area, you might go straight to a particular subject specific tool
If you are learning about a topic area, you might begin with a Google search
CQ Researcher*, Google, Wikipedia are all good examples of places to begin research to get an overview and better understanding of a topic.
Once you understand the language (keywords and concepts) in a specific research topic area
Most UCI Library databases use “Boolean” connectors. You can see examples of Boolean search strategies and connectors in the sections above. It's basically a very simple way to search a large template style database. These databases are often referred to as "template” or “field” search databases because of the search page design and use of search connectors in those search boxes or fields ...
Connector (“Boolean”) Essentials
AND searches for results with all of your search terms
Quotation Marks (“”) searches for a phrase with words in an exact order (Note that the "and" part of the phrase "cruel and unusual" is not interpreted by the database as an "AND" connector when surrounded by quotation marks)
