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SW 302: Literature Review and Evaluation

This guide is created to support SW 302.

How to Evaluate a Book or Article

Why do we evaluate books or articles?

  • Check if the source is relevant for our research topic
  • Help build our suggested intervention

Qualities to look for

Always keep in mind your research interest. How does this article/book relate to your topic?

Look for qualities like:

  • What is their question/hypothesis? What are they researching?
  • Who is being researched? Age-group? Ethnicity? Gender? Is anyone left out?
  • Where is the research happening? In the USA? In a hospital?
  • What is their practice strategy or intervention? What are the researchers trying out to see if it helps the group they're studying?
  • How are they measuring to see if the intervention worked? Are they doing interviews? Surveys?
  • What was the outcome of their study?

 

Write as You Read

You can stay organized while working on your literature review by writing as you read.

Writing as you read helps you avoid plagiarism. You can track which ideas from which authors you are using.

When you read an important section of text that is relevant to your research assignment, paraphrase the text. When you paraphrase, you:

  1. Apply another authors' ideas to your research topic.
  2. Show you understand the other authors' ideas and the context of your research topic.
  3. Still cite the author from whom the ideas originated.

To paraphrase as you read, you can follow these steps:

  1. Read the original text. Focus on the main ideas from the author. Check the author's citations and consider if those might be closer sources to the idea you want to paraphrase.
  2. In your own words, explain the original text to yourself or to a friend. Check your understanding of the passage.
  3. Ask yourself: How does this text apply to my research project?
  4. Write out a paraphrased version of the original text, including explaining how the text connects to your research topic. Keep track of what text you are citing.
  5. Check the paraphrased text you wrote. If you copied any of the original author's phrases, then those phrases need to be in quotation marks.
  6. Whenever you use your paraphrased text in your research project, always properly cite where you paraphrased from.

What Kind of Article did I Find?

The same journal can publish different types of articles. These article types might not all go through peer review (be refereed).

Not all publishers label their article types! Be on the lookout to check what type of article you have accessed!

Look at different article types with me in this Article Types Video.

Book Review

Book Review Example.

  • Book reviews often start with a citation of the book being reviewed. This might include a price.
  • Book reviews do not include original research.

Editorial

Editorial Example.

  • Editorials focus on the journal, journal issue, or another article published in the journal.
  • Editorials are written by editors.
  • Editorials do not include original research.

Opinion

Opinion Example.

  • Opinion pieces focus on a topic adjacent to actual research. They might discuss another published article, a community's attitude towards a research topic, or questions about a discipline practice.
  • Opinion pieces should not include original research.