Joining a conversation already in progress: Getting started with your literature review

The academic literature review is a way of getting familiar with the work that has already been done in your area of research -- as way to avoid 'reinventing the canoe'!

You can think of it as a way of joining a (research) conversation already in progress. It's a good idea when joining a conversation to listen in for a while and find out what progress others have made -- then to add your ideas in relation to what has gone before and what is ongoing now.

The UBC Library offers this helpful resource for starting your lit review. The Library also holds
regular lit review workshops for students, listed on the site linked here.

From the Library resources, here is a link to a database search worksheet that may be useful in the initial stages of refining your search through the literature.

In class today, we will try out a method known as 'backward and forward reference chaining', which is described here:

"Check out the citations in the reference lists of major studies. Examine what later studies have cited significant studies in these lists by searching".
I like to think of this method as 'roots and fruits': what are the roots of a particular research study (from its reference list), what are the roots of those roots, and what has sprung up based on this particular study (from its citations).