RESEARCH
METHODOLOGY
UNIT –I INTRODUCTION TO RESEARCH METHODOLOGY (PART-2)
BY
S.RAVIKUMAR
RESEARCH SCHOLAR
PONDICHERRY ENGINEERING COLLEGE
CONTENT
Research Process
Significance of research
Objective and Motivation
Types of Research
Research Process
Research Problem
formulation
Identification of Research
Topic
Problem Definition
• LITERATURE SURVEY
• LITERATURE REVIEW
• RESEARCH DESIGN
TERMINOLOGY & BASIC
CONCEPTS
• EXPERIMENTAL DESIGNS
LITERATURE SURVEY-Outline
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Literature Survey. Why?
Sources of Literature
Strategies to search
Awareness
Major publications & Reference
manager Tools
The Literature
A collection of all the scholarly
writings on a topic
The Literature Survey is not google
Literature Survey: Why?
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What approaches have others used?
What are the gaps?
What difference are you making?
Novelty in Familiarity and Familiarity in Novelty
Placing in Current Context
Avoiding duplication
Clarification of controversial results
State of the art: extend and build on the work of
others
Literature survey in the context of thesis
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Theses should be based on original research
Unintentional duplication is not acceptable
To gain knowledge of the background work
To establish context of your work
To question, Point out anomalies / gaps
Sources of Literature
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Open Access
INDEST Arrangement
Your Library Subscriptions
Peer Sharing sources: ResearchGate,
academia.edu
Sources of Literature
Primary Sources
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Journals
Periodicals
Research Reports
Conference Proceedings
Official Publications
Standards
Theses, Dissertations
To be published works
Secondary Sources
• Compilations
• Reviews
• Reference Books / Handbooks /
Encyclopedia / Dictionaries
• Text books / Monographs
• Indexing and Abstracting services
Tertiary Sources
• Directories, Year books, Bibliographies
• List of secondary sources
Other Sources
Examples
• Dictionaries and Handbooks: classical lists of definitions, alphabetical
list of compounds with data.
• Encyclopedias: relevant topics in alphabetical order, may be too
elementary for expert.
• Physical data collections: spectra, thermodynamic parameters, etc.
• Reactions and syntheses guides.
• Analytical methods.
• Comprehensive treatises on specialist topics.
Some Terminology- Literature Search
• International Standard Book Number (ISBN)
• International Standard Serial Number (ISSN)
• Digital Object Identifier (DOI) number: online Publication
Universal Decimal Classification (UDC) catalogue : Books
• Research Information Services (RIS)format : Bibliographic
Information
• BibTeX (.bib) format: Bibliographic Information
JOURNAL IMPACT FACTOR
AWARNESS
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Journal impact factor is that to see how many times the articles in a
particular journal are being referred by other journals and other articles
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basically it gives you a sense of how often these articles are being read and
being used by other scientists
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This is a number which is controversial; one cannot compare these impact
factors across research areas.
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In communities - research communities - where the number of journals are
limited, the number of scientists are limited, then the journal impact factor tends to
be on the lower side.
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It is not an absolute method by which we can say a journal is less or more
important.
Citation Index
AWARNESS
This is about a journal article; how many times has it been cited. We do call some articles
as citation classics.
What we mean by that is there is an article that has been referred by so many people,
maybe hundreds, that you could now call it as a classic.
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Citation is basically how many times it has been referred by other successful
journal publications.
h-Index
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controversial index; it basically refers to how many times a particular author’s
publications have been cited and how many of them exceed the number of publications.
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basically when we say that an author has an h-index of say n, then he has n papers
that are cited n times or more. So, which also means that an author, who has higher h index,
is an author whose papers are being read widely and are being referred widely. And, most
probably, he is a more successful scientist.
JOURNAL PAPER
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CONFERENCE PAPER
Exact and qualitative research Less strict review..
result…..
 May be the results of few
Published after strict review
months or a year ago..
by other experts
 Can hear the authors talk
May be the results of few
directly in the meeting.
year ago research
TECHNICAL REPORTS
• Usually from government or industryfunded research like NICEE, IITK
GSDMA
• often contain information before it is
published in a journal – but not
reviewed by referees (i.e. not ‘peer
reviewed’).
• some agencies (NASA, DOE) may place
reports on the web.
• Abstracted by Chemical Abstracts.
CONFERENCE PAPERS
• Papers presented at a
conference may be
‘published’ intact
• usually no experimental
details
• usually not peer-reviewed
• abstracted by Chemical
Abstracts
Strategies to search
• Keyword search: systematic manual
search
• Backward chronological search :
snowball or back reference method
• Forward chronological search :
citation based
Strategy to Search
• Defining key words may be difficult – there are no specific guidelines
• Focus on key words and phrases which define the topic.
• Choose the field carefully: Article Title Abstract keywords / Authors /
First Author / Source Title / Article Title / Keywords / Affiliation
(Name, City, Country) language / ISSN /DOI/ Reference /Conferences
etc
• Choose the Time Span
– Published from YYYY/all years to YYYY/present
• Pick the Subject areas as appropriate
Strategies of Search
• It is often useful to start reading with the most recent publications.
This allows:
1) Focusing more quickly on current knowledge,
2) Recent research often includes references to relevant earlier
research
• First read the abstract or summary to determine relevance of the
article.
• As you read, keep in mind that the central purpose is to identify and
describe the relevance of the study to your research.
STRATEGIES TO SEARCH
BACKWARD CHRONOLOGICAL
SEARCH (CITATIONS)
FORWARD CHRONOLOGICAL
SEARCH (CITATIONS)
• Identify the latest relevant
paper in your area
• Look up each of the
references listed
• Repeat to extend the tree
backward
• Identify the citation classic in
your area
• Lookup which all papers refers
to it
• Find out which of these are
well cited
• Repeat to extend the tree
forward
Citation Information
• Thomson ISI / Web of Science
(isiknowlegde.com)-THMOSON REUTERS
• SciFinder (www.cas.org)
• Scopus (www.scopus.com)
• Scitation (scitation.aip.org)
Major Publishers
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Elsevier
Springer
Taylor and Francis
Nature
Maney Publishing
APS, AIP, ACS, AIChE, TMS, ASM, ACM, IEEE,
etc
Online access
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Science Direct-(Elsevier)
Springer Link
Informa World
Ingenta Connect
Crossref.org
Prola.aps.org etc.,
Reference Mangers
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JabRef
EndNote
Reference Mangers
ProCite
Mendeley
Zotero
Comparison of reference Management software on
Wikipedia
LITERATURE REVIEW
...is a process of reviewing work
of others within your field and using that as
basis for your data collection.
Basic advice :
Structuring your literature review is a important
and creative task
Purposes of the Literature Review
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The central purpose of the Literature Review is to provide the researcher
(and the reader) with an understanding of literature about the proposed
research.
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This includes the strengths and weaknesses!
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The research problem is the focus of the literature review
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But the literature may be related to the research project in several ways –
through the problem, the objectives, the conceptual framework, and
methods and procedures.
Specific purposes, functions and benefits of a
literature review include:
A. Prevents duplication of what has already been done
(Some duplication or confirmation of research is necessary, but
excessive duplication is wasteful)
B. Help to identify new areas where research is needed
(and how new research can contribute)
C. Provides ideas and direction for:
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How to handle problems encountered
Techniques
Sources of data
Novel approaches for the research
Notes
• Be sure you have a complete citation of each source.
• Keep written notes – don’t rely on memory.
• Be thorough and systematic in keeping notes; note problem,
objectives, methods, findings and conclusions
• Note questions, shortcomings or problems with the study.
• Notes can be on note card, full sheets of paper, or directly in word
processing files (which can use the “search” function).