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What is a Literature Review?
Before you begin searching for sources for your literature review, it is helpful to know what a literature review is so that you include all the necessary sources. A literature review is a systematic examination of the scholarly literature about one's topic. It critically analyzes, evaluates, and synthesizes research findings, theories, and practices by scholars and researchers that are related to an area of focus. In reviewing the literature, the write should present a comprehensive, critical and accurate understanding tof the current state of knowledge, compare different research studies and theories, reveal gaps in current literature, and indicate what is already known about the topic of choice (p. 2 Efron, Sara Efrat, and Ruth Ravid. Writing the Literature Review : A Practical Guide, Guilford Publications, 2018. ProQuest Ebook Central, https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vand/detail.action?docID=5522670.
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Tertiary Sources: Annual Reviews, Subject Bibliographies & More
There might already an existing bibliography or literature review to give you a head start.The following sources can be good places to check .
- Annual Reviews This link opens in a new windowCritical reviews written by leading scientists in the biomedical, life, physical, and social sciences including economics. Annual Reviews are highly cited in ISI's Journal Citation Reports.
- Oxford Bibliographies This link opens in a new windowLiterary guide to significant sources on a variety of subjects. Works as an annotated bibliography and a high-level encyclopedia.
Selecting Sources to Search
A good literature review should be as comprehensive as necessary to identify all of the major works and debates on your research subject.
Subject-specific Databases - search in databases specific to your discipline of study to find more sources in your field. For example, Sociological Abstracts specializes in Sociology and will have more coverage of the sociology literature than an interdisciplinary, all-purpose database such as ProQuest. You should also search in more than one place (i.e. multiple databases and the library search) since no one search tool covers everything. For example, if your topic involves education, consider also searching an education database, such as Education Fulltext.
Here are ideas about finding places to search.
Databases A-Z - Once you've identified disciplines or information types, consult the Databases A-Z list by subject. A Research Guide for a specific subject may also have some suggestions.
Library Search Tool - The Library Search Tool also searches a variety of databases for books and journal articles at once. However, it does not search everything, so be sure to also look at disciplinary databases.
Google Scholar - also search for your topic in Google Scholar. If you have a relevant source, consider searching the title in Google Scholar and using the “Cited By” link and the “Related Articles” to locate more literature. See also Bibliography Mining and Cited Reference Searching
WorldCat - If your discipline publishes its scholarship in books, the WorldCat database is a place to look.
Citation Tracing (Backward and Forward)
Citation Tracing Backward (Bibliography Mining) - use the list of works cited from a relevant source to learn more about a topic from the works cited or to see if important works are missing. This is a way to look for relevant sources published prior to the one in hand. A database may have a direct link to all the works cited, such as the example below; otherwise, you may need to look at each work cited manually. The database Web of Science has links to references, as do ProQuest databases.
Citation Tracing Forward (Cited Reference Searching) -This finds newer sources that cite a particular article, book chapter, etc. It also uncovers newer research on a topic.
- Web of Science This link opens in a new window
Citation database from journals and international conference proceedings. Cross-search of the Web of Science Core Collection, BIOSIS Previews, and the SciELO Citation Index (Latin America, Spain, Portugal, the Caribbean and South Africa).
Google Scholar allows one to trace a citation forward but not backwards.
- Google Scholar Vanderbilt Login This link opens in a new window
- Web of Science: Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI) This link opens in a new windowSocial sciences journals, and science and technical journals related to the social sciences. Complete bibliographic data, author abstracts, and references cited.
- Web of Science: Arts & Humanities Citation Index (A&HCI) This link opens in a new windowIndexes of arts and humanities journals, and selected items from scientific and social sciences journals. Complete bibliographic data and author abstracts for articles in the arts and humanities. Each citation includes a list of references cited in the source article.
- Web of Science: Science Citation Index Expanded This link opens in a new windowMajor journals across science disciplines. Complete bibliographic data and author abstracts. Each citation includes a list of references cited in the source article.
Beyond Vanderbilt
Beyond Vanderbilt - if you find a citation for a source Vanderbilt doesn't own, use Document Delivery/Interlibrary Loan (ILL) to get it. Articles and chapters can usually be scanned and sent electronically, but books must be mailed and typically arrive in 1-2 weeks, so plan ahead. TIP: If you see FindIt@VU, follow the links and sign in to have the form automatically filled out for you.
