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 This is a time consuming process
that will take a great deal of time and effort initially, but will more
than likely continue throughout the semester, since you will need to
refine your writing throughout and include new literature in your
discussion.
Students who are not familiar with the library search engines
struggle at this step, as do students who have not done a good job of
defining their research question.
Therefore, if you find you are struggling, come see your instructor
or visit the library to get help. It is not difficult to identify
sources; you do not need to print out hundreds of pages and read them
to determine whether an article will work for you. There are shortcuts
and easier ways to get your literature. Some basic points:
- Go to
prestigious scientific journals. Do not use the web as a source.
There are many problems with information obtained from the web,
and therefore it should not be used in academic and scientific
work. The only time you may want to use web resources is to obtain
statistics about the problem you are studying, and then you will
only go to government sources, such as NIH
to obtain those.
- Our campus now
has APA journals online, which means you can get them without
having to search the actual journals at the library. Go to the
tutorial linked below to learn how to do this.
- Spend some time
deciding what keywords you will use. If you just type in your
variables, you may find there are thousands of articles available,
if so, immediately refine your search with more descriptors so you
don't have to wade through hundreds of titles to find those that
are relevant to you. Again, go to the tutorial below to learn how
to do this.
- Once you've
found an article that seems to be relevant to you, read the
abstract. You may find that it is not relevant at all and you will
save time and paper by not printing it.
- Use the
reference sections of the articles (which you can ask for along
with the abstract through psychinfo for
your search) to identify more articles relevant to you. Even if an
article does not work, it may reference articles that may work for
you.
- If every article
you read references (mentions) a certain article, make sure you
find it! It may be the study that started it all,
it may be the seminal piece without which you cannot convince the
reader of the value of your paper.
- You cannot
reference abstracts. If you can't find an article, you'll have to
give it up as a reference.
- You cannot
usually reference from the introduction of an article. That is
because most of what is there is a summary of what others have
done. Find the original article and read it and reference it if
necessary. Only reference from the introduction if the author has
summarized and concluded from his/her readings and that is what
you are referring to. Usually, you will reference from the results
and discussion sections only, but you will need to read all the
paper to do a good job of understanding what the findings mean.
Below you will find helpful links for this step in the
capstone experience:
Conducting an Academic Literature
Review
 Tutorial prepared by
University Library - Designed to help you take advantage
of the most recent innovations in search engines and new search engine
technology.
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