Conducting Literature Review For Dissertation In Simplest Way
Conducting Literature Review
A dissertation is the lengthiest academic writing task, and a literature review is the most time-consuming part of the dissertation writing process. Students often feel intimidating while conducting a literature Memorize Quran Online. The best approach to cracking the nutshell is to calmly accept the challenges instead of being afraid of them. This article aims to motivate students’ planning to conduct a literature review in the upcoming days. It will discuss the literature review, its types, starting ways, steps to writing it, and some ways to self-motivate you.
What Are Literature Reviews And Their Types?
A literature review is a comprehensive summary of all the already published information on a topic under discussion. It is the qualitative method of collection of data through secondary sources like scholarly articles, books, databases, and other authentic web- sources. A literature review allows researchers to develop a deep understanding of the research problem and screen the quality of the work already performed by field experts to solve a problem.
It brings clarity to a research problem, improves a research methodology and helps contextualize your findings. A literature review is the only part of the dissertation that can stand alone. It is not only the process of discussing other authors’ work in your field of study; rather, it includes the identification, evaluation and synthesis of information in a logical manner. It is of various types. Some of them are as follows:
- Systematic literature review
- Historical Review
- Theoretical Literature review
- Meta-analysis or meta-synthesis
- Integrative literature review
How Do You Start A Literature Review For A Dissertation?
Conducting a literature review is the lengthiest part of dissertation writing. However, smart techniques by getting masters dissertation help and better planning can help you complete this task without being stressed. The simplest way to conduct a literature review is to divide it into three phases namely preparatory, writing and proofreading. Moreover, the quality of the literature review solely depends on how effectively you completed the preparatory phase. The preparatory phase for conducting literature review includes:
Selection Of Topic:
The selection of a topic is the first part of the preparatory phase for conducting literature review. During selection, the author must focus on the clarity, conciseness and significance of the selected topic.
Selection Of Potential Keywords:
Keywords identification is another important step in conducting literature review. Keywords streamline the search results and help browse the most relevant research articles.
Research:
Research is the key to resolve all academic writing problems. Deep and thorough research fastens the dissertation writing process. For conducting a good literature review, you must do good research before going into the writing phase.
Evaluation Of Quality Of Information Reported In The Selected Literature
Research helps select the highly relevant research articles. After making a complete source library, the next step that you must do before writing is to screen the quality of information. Once you get satisfied with your search, you can confidently move on to the writing phase of conducting literature review.
Outlining Other Author’s Work In A Way To Make A Well-Structured Essay
The last step in the preparatory phase is outlining a clear structure for your literature review. A literature review is a form of the essay, so you can structure it into three parts: introduction, body and conclusion. The work of other authors must be part of the body, while the introduction and conclusion must specify the significance of your own study.
By following these five steps, you can take a head start in a writing literature review.
Conducting A Literature Review-Step By Step Guide:
The majorities of undergraduate students search the data, stuff the information and entitle the document as ‘Literature review’. In contrast, the literature review is something more than haphazardly pasting of paraphrased data from already published reports. For conducting a good literature review, you must follow a complete step by step guide. Given below are some simple and easy steps for conducting literature review that even the undergraduate students can follow:
Select A Narrow Topic
Regardless of the type of review you are conducting, the first step must be to define your area of interest. An interesting topic helps researchers in keeping their morale high throughout the study.
Develop A Strategy
This step aims to figure out which databases and search strategies can give the best results. The search strategy is important as it allows readers to measure the credibility and methodology of reviews.
Search The Information
Following the search strategy, the collection of data for conducting literature review becomes easy. It allows researchers to collect the source material in the shortest possible time.
Evaluate And Quantify The Information
The searched articles contain a lot of information, but it is not necessary that every piece of information goes well with your research goals. Thus, step four is all about evaluating the quality of the information in the source and adding it to your content.
Synthesize
The most critical step of the literature review is synthesis. It demands good critical and analytical thinking skills from researchers. It includes a deep understanding of facts provided in others’ study for the purpose of supporting your findings.
Explain The Significance Of Your Work In The Light Of Other’s Work
At this step, you have almost done with the literature review. The purpose of this step is to evaluate your own work or sum up the findings of the review. Moreover, you must critically review your own work to measure the level of quality and credibility of your research.
Tips For Conducting Literature Review In The Most Simple And Easy Ways:
Self-motivation is an essential thing that recharges students when they feel dulled and stressed. Thus, while doing academic writing, especially dissertation literature review, one should keep himself motivated. To be motivated, you can follow the following steps:
- Mark your goals on the calendar and try to meet your benchmarks.
- Work smart, not hard, for improving your academic performance.
- Divide the long literature review into small tasks to build momentum.
- Track your progress and never try for perfection (accept your pitfalls).
- Take feedback from your seniors to ensure whether you are on the right track.
Final Thoughts:
Most students think literature review is only the act of compiling other authors’ work. In reality, it is the act of searching, evaluating, identifying, outlining, and summarising all note-worthy and relevant studies. Starting a review is a bit tricky, but once you are on the right track, writing a review is a fun. The only thing that you must do is to motivate yourself while conducting literature review.
