LITERATURE REVIEW

 In the process of preparing research proposal the

crucial stage is identifying the types of data
needed in your study. Knowing the types of data
is important because it determine the types of
research that you need to carry out. Data are
simply facts. In the process of research proposal,
information on subject matter is important.
Information refers to a body of facts in a format
suitable for decision-making or in a context that
defines relationships between pieces of data.
 Basically there are two types of data; secondary
data and primary data.
 The aim of literature review is to highlight
what has been done so far in the field of
interest and how your findings relate to
earlier research.
 It could also indicate whether you are trying
to replicate earlier studies in a different
context.
 Review of literature also reveals techniques
and statistical procedures that have not been
attempted by others. To do a review of
literature, you need to locate, read and
evaluate research documents, reports, theses
and other types of academic materials.
 Improve Research Methodology
Literature review helps you to acquire
methodologies used by other researchers to
find and solve research questions similar to
the ones you are investigating
 . Focus on Research Problem
it helps to understand the relationship
between your research problem and the body
of knowledge in your research area.
 Cater to Knowledge Base for Research Area
It is fundamental that you know what others
are doing in your field of interest or similar
topics as well as understand theories that
have been put forward and gaps that exist in
the field.
 Ensure Novelty in Work
By doing a review of literature, you do not run
the risk of “reinventing the wheel,” which
means wasting efforts on trying to rediscover
something that is already known or published
in the research arena. Therefore, through
literature review, you could ensure novelty
and new contribution in your research work.
 A survey of the literature is important due to some
reasons:
 To help the researcher to include all the relevant
variables in the research.
 To facilitate the creative integration of the
information gathered with what is found in
previous study.
 To provides the foundation for developing a
comprehensive theoretical framework from which
hypotheses can be developed for testing. (last
lecture)
 Based on the specific research problems and
factors identified during the research process,
literature reviews are needs to be done on the
variables chosen. There are three steps involves
when conducting literature survey:
1. Identifying the relevant sources
 Almost every local and private university has
computer online systems and subscribes to
establish index such as Science Direct,
EBSCOhost, Euro monitor and Proquest etc. You
can locate and print out published information
on various topics within split seconds.
2.Extracting the relevant information
 The next steps are to extract the right
information form the sources that you collect.
You can choose hundreds or more listings, a
glance of the article or book, abstract which one
is relevant to your study.
 While you start reading the articles, you can
systematically note all the detailed information
on the problem that was researched, design
sample (sample size and data collection
methods) and the findings of the article.
 All the articles considered relevant to your study
should be listed as references and using the
appropriate referencing format.
 Writing up the literature review
 The last step is writing up the literature
review or the documentation of the relevant
studies citing the author and the year of the
study. Such documentation is important to be
included in research proposal or final write up to
convince the reader that:
 you has done a thorough investigation on the
subject matter and knowledgeable about the
problem area you are conducting.
 to fill the gap of knowledge with the existing
theoretical framework and the current theoretical
framework which you will developed.
 to avoid plagiarism
 Primary data
 According to Zikmund (2003) primary data are
gathered and assembled specifically for the
research project at hand, and usually done by
survey research.
 For example, if your research is on consumer
perceptions on internet banking, so you have to
construct a questionnaires asking people on their
perceptions.(detail process of data collection will
be elaborated in the next chapter)
1. Fact finding
 In order to solve some common business
problems, secondary data are used in research as a
fact finding. The objectives of the research are
aiming at collecting descriptive information to
support decision making to solve the business
problems.
2. Model Building
 Model building is more complex than fact finding
because it involves specifying relationship between
two or more variables. However in the model
development it usually starts with a descriptive or
predictive equations and it does not involve a
complex mathematical process. Managers use
model building to estimate market potential and
need information about the future to forecast
sales.
 The primary advantages of secondary data to the
business researchers are the use of others’
experience and data. In addition secondary data;
 Faster
 Less expensive
 Less activities such as field trip, survey etc
1. Outdated information and gap of data
Secondary data must be timely in order to predict the
future.
2. Variation in definition of terms
3. Researchers frequently encounter secondary data that
reports on a
population of interest that is similar to, but not directly
comparable to, the population of interest to the
researcher.
4. Differing units of measurement
5. Differing units of measurement may cause problems
if they are not identical to the researcher’s needs; often
the primary study may dictate that the data be
summarized, rounded, or reported in such a way that it is
not useful to the secondary research needs.
6. Inaccurate or biased
a. Market share data: Market tracking refers to the
observation and analysis of trends in industry volume
and brand share over time.
b. Scanner data: Market tracking through optical
character recognition such as the universal product
code and other optical scanners provides a wealth of
accurate and rapid product and brand sales
information collectively known as scanner data.
c) Demographic and census updates.
d) Attitude and public opinion research: Specialized
syndicated services report the findings of attitude
research and opinion polls.
e. Stock market sources: Numerous firms sell information
on aggregate market and individual stocks.
1. Books and periodicals: Books and periodicals
provide a wealth of information. Libraries stock
many bibliographies, guides, directories, and
indexes. Professional journals and commercial
business periodicals can be especially valuable
sources of data.
2. Government sources: Government agencies
produce a prolific amount of data. Federal
government data (e.g., the Census of
Population) can be counted on for accuracy and
quality of investigation. State, county, and local
government data is often more current and
structured to meet local needs than federal
data.

3. Media sources: Information on a broad range
of subjects is available from broadcast and
print media. The media like to show that their
vehicles for advertising are viewed or heard by
the advertising target market. Such
information is generally free of charge and can
be useful. However, it should be given careful
evaluation as it often covers limited aspects of a
topic.
4. Commercial sources: Numerous firms
specialize in selling information
• Step 1: Search the Existing Literature in Your
Research Area of Interest
Once you choose your topic of interest, make
sure it is a well-researched and well-studied area
which could give you more literature of research
to choose from. Now, you can proceed to search
the existing literature. To effectively search
literature, have in mind some idea of the broad
subject area and the problem you wish to
investigate.
• Abstracts of articles (e.g. Dissertations Abstracts
International, Emerald and IT Knowledge Base)
• Citation indices (e.g. ProQuest and Scopus)
• Step 2: Review the Literature Obtained
Once you have identified several journals and
books, the next thing to do is to start reading
them critically to pull together themes and issues
that are associated with your research topic.
• Note whether the knowledge relevant to your
designed framework has been confirmed beyond
doubt;
• Find differences of opinions among researchers
and jot down your opinions about their validity;
and
• Examine the gaps that exist in the body of
knowledge.
 Step 3: Develop a Theoretical Framework
Your theoretical framework will provide you a
base and guide to read further. The best
practice would be to develop a framework
first and then dive into literature search or
vice-versa. Of course, as you read more
about your research area, you are likely to
change the framework.
• Step 4: Writing up the Literature Review
Compare and evaluate findings based on:
– Theories related to the area of study
– Hypotheses
– Research designs applied
– Variables selected
• We will go in-depth on hypotheses and
research designs in the coming topics in this
module. Most importantly, avoid plagiarism
when writing.
• The review is a mere description of various
materials without showing the relation between
the studies and the main objective of the
research topic.
• Students tend to cut and paste, which SHOULD
NOT be encouraged. Original works should be
cited and quoted.
• Journals or reports that are included are not
critically evaluated.

• There is some evidence to suggest that students

sometimes do not read the original works and
instead take someone else’s work and cite it as
though they had read the primary source.
 Step 1: Read and Understand the Abstract
What was the research about? Are the
objectives or aims of the study specified
clearly?
 Was the design used for the study described
clearly?
 What are the reasons for understanding the
research?
 Step 2: Read and Understand the Introduction
 References made may be short and brief
because it is assumed that you know the
people in the field.
 Do some critique on the research questions
to determine whether they are applicable to
the theme of study.
• Step 3: Read the Methodology Section
• This section describes the methods used to
collect data and the background of the
subjects.
• Were the issues of validity and reliability
discussed?
• If the topic was design and development, was
the framework explained in sufficient detail?
Could it have been done in another way?
 Step 4: Read the Results Section
 This section describes the connection
between the results and the research
questions or hypotheses.
 It reports results relating to the research
questions and other statistically significant
results.
 Step 5: Read and Understand the Discussion
Section
 This section describes main findings and
relates these to the Introduction section.
 You need to identify weaknesses or
limitations of the study, as highlighted by the
author.