CHAPTER 3
CONDUCTING AND WRITING YOUR OWN LITERATURE REVIEW
TEACHING ACTIVITIES FOR CHAPTER 3
Activity 1. Preparing a research proposal.
You will want to emphasize this chapter if your major assignment in this course is to have students write a
literature review on a particular topic or if your students are expected to write a literature review as a final project
for a degree.
As an assignment, you can ask students to read one or both of the literature reviews (a professional review and a
meta-analysis) at the end of Chapter 3 and write a brief paper stating each one’s strengths and weaknesses. Also,
Activity 2. Classifying citations obtained from a literature search.
Students can easily be overwhelmed by the number of citations that are retrieved when they enter a keyword or
phrase in a search engine like ERIC. If you have a classroom that enables you to project your laptop computer
screen onto a large screen, you can illustrate the classification process.
You can log onto ERIC, enter a keyword on an interesting topic, and then display the full set of bibliographic
citations retrieved on the classroom screen. You can have students read, let’s say, the first ten citations. Ask them
to describe which citations they would eliminate, and why. Then ask them to develop a few categories by which the
remaining citations can be classified. When this is done, you can display five more citations and then ask students
MULTIPLE-CHOICE TEST ITEMS FOR CHAPTER 3
1. Research articles generally are considered more authoritative if
a. they appear in a journal sponsored by a professional organization.
b. the authors are affiliated with a research institute.
c. they are included in the ERIC database.
d. they are peer-reviewed.
2. A formal literature review
a. can tell you the state of knowledge about a problem of practice.
b. should not be a basis for designing the methodology of your study.
c. should be done as the last step of the research-proposal process.
d. can now be done simply by using the search engine Google.
3. The main difference between a bibliographic index and a search engine is that
a. bibliographic indexes are published in print form rather than on the Internet.
b. search engines are used to look for journal articles, whereas bibliographic indexes are used to look
for books.
c. search engines allow users to look for publications based on user-defined criteria.
d. bibliographic indexes list publications dating back 100 hundred years or more, whereas search
engines only list publications dating back to the advent of personal computers.
4. The main difference between primary and secondary sources is that
a. primary sources, but not secondary sources, are written by those who actually conducted the
research described in the publication.
b. primary sources, but not secondary sources, are subjected to peer review.
c. secondary sources generally include a more complete description of a research study’s methodology
than primary sources do.
d. secondary sources include less comprehensive literature reviews than do primary sources.
5. Classifying the publications identified from a literature search into categories is
a. a procedure more often used by qualitative researchers than by quantitative researchers.
b. typically done after you have read all relevant publications.
c. useful for suggesting strategies for synthesizing your findings.
d. most appropriate for the types of publications indexed in Resources in Education.
6. Reports of research studies in education typically follow the format of the
a. Publication Manual of the American Educational Research Association.
b. Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association.
c. Publication Manual of the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.
d. Chicago Manual of Style.
7. Research studies published in journals generally
a. include an extensive literature review.
b. include a brief literature review.
c. only refer to the previous study that most influenced the study being reported.
d. do not describe previous studies, but instead refer the reader to relevant literature reviews published
elsewhere.
8. The report of a literature review can be organized by having a separate section for each
a. research question.
b. research hypothesis.
c. category used to classify the publications retrieved by the literature search.
d. All of the above.
9. The main advantage of a chart essay over a standard written report of a literature review is that it
a. can be read more quickly.
b. focuses on findings that support the researchers’ hypotheses.
c. presents review findings in a simple, condensed format.
d. can be more easily understood by nonresearchers.
10. Put the following steps involved in conducting a literature review into the order in which they typically
are carried out, from 1 to 4.
___ a. Using a preliminary source.
___ b. Preparing a report of the review findings.
___ c. Framing the questions that will guide the literature search.
___ d. Reading relevant primary sources.
11. Meta-analysis synthesizes the findings of studies on a particular research problem by
a. comparing the number of studies that obtained a positive effect from an intervention with the
number of studies that obtained a negative effect from the intervention.
b. examining the raw data for each study and computing descriptive statistics for them.
c. examining the raw data and making a generalization that best represents the data.
d. translating the statistical results of each study into an effect-size statistic.
12. An effect-size statistic provides information about
a. the magnitude of the difference between an experimental group and control group on tests
administered at the end of the experiment.
b. the number of publications included in the database of different search engines.
c. whether to include a particular study in a literature review.
d. the quality of the methodology used in a research study.
13. Interpretation of the magnitude of an effect-size statistic
a. depends on the measures that have been used in a study.
b. does not depend on the measures that have been used in a study.
c. depends on the size of the sample that was studied.
d. depends on the homogeneity of the sample on certain demographic variables.
14. One of the main features of a meta-ethnography is that it
a. can result in new findings based on the researchers interpretation of case studies.
b. allows for the use of prespecified themes to synthesize case studies.
c. involves the calculation of several effect sizes for each case study included in the review.
d. includes techniques for analyzing both quantitative and qualitative research studies.
15. Indicate whether each of the following publications is most likely a primary (P) or secondary (S) source.
___ a.A textbook on educational research
___ b. A review in which the author summarizes findings from her many research studies on computer-
assisted instruction over the past 20 years
___ c.A paper in which the author proposes a theory of the causes of attention deficit disorder
___ d. A dissertation study of disabled students’ use of learning strategies
___ e.A meta-analysis of research on the effectiveness of bilingual education programs
___ f. An account by a school’s first principal of the school’s early history
SHORT-ANSWER TEST ITEMS FOR CHAPTER 3
1. State one reason why it is desirable to read the key primary sources relevant to your problem area directly
rather than relying on the description of a primary source contained in a secondary source.
2. Describe one advantage of reading an authoritative secondary source related to your problem early in your
literature review.
3. Describe three typical characteristics of a professional review in education.
4. Describe two recommendations given in the text for writing a report of the findings of a literature review.
CHAPTER 3
CONDUCTING AND WRITING YOUR OWN LITERATURE REVIEW
Multiple-Choice Test Items
Short-Answer Test Items
