REVIEW OF LITERATURE

Meaning

• Literature Review is the documentation of a comprehensive review of the published and unpublished work from secondary sources of data in the areas of specific interest to the researcher.
• The main aim is to find out problems that are already investigated and those that need further investigation.
• It is an extensive survey of all available past studies relevant to the field of investigation.
• It gives us knowledge about what others have found out in the related field of study and how they have done so.

NEED / PURPOSE OF REVIEW

·         To gain a background knowledge of the research topic.

·         To identify the concepts relating to it, potential relationships between them and to formulate researchable hypothesis.

·         To identify appropriate methodology, research design, methods of measuring concepts and techniques of analysis.

·         To identify data sources used by other researchers.

·         To learn how others structured their reports.

nA knowledge of Related Literature enables to define the Frontiers of the Field

nUnderstanding of the theory enables to place the Question in a Wider Perspective

nRelated Literature recommends Procedures / Methods /Instructions

nAvoids unintentional Replication of Previous Research

nBetter position to interpret the significance of the study and its results

How to conduct the Literature Survey?

¡Identify the relevant sources.

¡Extract and Record relevant information.

¡Write-up the Literature Review.

SOURCES OF LITERATURE

• Encyclopedia

-          Generic ex: Encyclopedia Britannica

-          Specific ex: Encyclopedia on Social Sciences

• Books – Year Books

-          Text Books

-          Reference Books

• Journal – Monthly, Quarterly, Half-yearly, annual
• Magazines – Weekly, Bi-weekly, etc
• Handbook/Monographs
• Govt. and Industry Reports
• Seminar Reports / Abstracts
• Newspaper/Bulletin
• Research Dissertation and Thesis
• Documents
• Internets

-          Electronic Databases

-          Bibliographic Databases

-          Abstract Databases

-          Full-Text Databases

Guidelines for Evaluating Internet

¡Internet is not a Library

¡Checklist of main points

nAuthorship

nSponsorship

nPoint of View

nRelevance

nVerifiability

nCurrency

Search Engines

¡A specialized device that searches the Web for documents that match key words, proper names, and phrases

RECORDING THE LITERATURE

lThe most suitable method of recording notes is the card system.   

lThe recording system involves use of two sets of cards:

¡Source cards (3”x 5”) – used for noting bibliographic information.

¡Note cards (5”x 8”) – used for actual note taking.

SOURCE CARDS

lSource Cards serve two purposes:

¡Provide documentary information for foot notes.

¡It is used for compiling bibliography to be given at the end of the report.

lSource Cards can be coded by a simple system inorder to relate them to the corresponding note cards.

lMarking a combination of letters and a number on the right hand top corner that begins with ‘C’. For example; C1, C2 etc.

                                    OR

lMarking the letter ‘B’ or ‘J’ or ‘R’ (B=Books, J=Journal, R=Report) on the left hand top corner.

lThe recording of bibliographic information should be made in proper bibliographic format.

lThe format for citing a book is:

¡Author’s name, (year), Title of the book, Place of publication, Publisher’s name.

lFor Example; Koontz Harold (1980), Management, New Delhi, McGraw-Hill International.

lThe format for citing a journal article is:

¡Author’s name, (year), Title of the article, Journal name, Volume (number), pages.

lFor Example; Sheth J.N (1973), A Model of Industrial Buying Behaviour, Journal of Marketing, 37(4), 50-56.

NOTE CARDS

lDetailed Information extracted from a printed source is recorded on the note cards.  

lIt is desirable to note a single fact or idea on each card, on one side only.

Writing the literature review

¡Writing the literature review well is a sign of professional maturity;

¡it indicates one’s grasp of the field, one’s methodological sophistication in critiquing others’ research, and the breadth and depth of one’s reading

Bibliography

A bibliography is a list of writings that share a common factor: this may be a topic, a language, a period, or some other theme. The list may be comprehensive or selective. One particular instance of this is the list of sources used or considered in preparing a work, sometimes called a reference list.

Webliography

A critical guide to electronic resources on the World Wide Web and CD-ROM, including electronic texts, HTML-encoded texts, hypertexts, secondary works, commentaries, and indexes