1. Reading the Literature
Psych 231: Research Methods in Psychology

2. Why review the literature
What is the underlying motivation(s) for doing a review of the literature?
Getting ideas.
What has been done, what hasn’t been done?
Avoid past mistakes.
Understanding the relevant theories.
What variables are important?

3. What is the literature?
Primary Sources - essentially reading the original report
Journal articles
Edited books (sometimes)
Professional meetings
Electronic publishing (fairly new, pluses and minuses)
Faculty members & other personal communications
Secondary Sources - reading a report of the report
Literature Reviews
Psychological Bulletin, Annual Review of Psychology
Text books
Citations in books and articles

4. What is the literature? Secondary Sources: Advantages: Disadvantages:
Good starting place
Often reviews a lot of relevant literature
Relatively brief descriptions
Disadvantages:
Somebody else’s description
May be incorrect
May be biased
Not enough detail

5. How do I search the literature?
Reference sections of articles, book chapters, and books.
Searchable databases (largely replacing printed databases)
PsycInfo, PsycLit, Psychological Abstracts, etc.
Social Sciences Citation Index – who has cited a particular paper

6. Literature search problems
the library doesn't have it
Ask the librarian for help
inter-library loan:
UIUC library (hours posted at: )

7. The time line of research reporting
Start time (this process may take days to years)
Get your idea, run your study, analyze the data
Reported results
Present at a conference
Submit written research report
Peer review process

8. The peer review process
Submit the research report to editor of desired journal
Editor selects 3 to 4 peers to review the paper
This is sometimes a ‘blind’ process
Each reviewer reviews the paper & sends editor recommendation
Typically first time submissions don’t get accepted
Revise and resubmit
Eventually the paper is either accepted or rejected
“In press” it may be up to a year before an accepted article appears in print
Typically it takes up to two years between initial submission and final acceptance

9. The time line of research reporting
Start time (this process may take days to years)
Get your idea, run your study, analyze the data
Reported results
Present at a conference
Submit written research report
Peer review process
Publication in a journal
Cited in other research
Cited in textbooks

10. The time line of research reporting
Years
Send to
journal
Starts
work
Finishes
work 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 13
Journal publication
Textbooks
Convention paper
Annual Review
Psych Abstracts
Cited in articles

11. Reading a research article
What's the goal of a research article?
The reader to:
Know about the research
Understand what was done
Be convinced by the research (hopefully)
Standardization of research report format
APA style
Organization and content reflects the logical thinking in scientific investigation
Standardization helps with clarity
Read with a critical eye

12. The anatomy of a research article
The basic parts of a research article :
Title and authors - gives you a general idea of the topic and specifically who did it
Abstract - short summary of the article
States the issue, the methods, major variables of interst, the findings, and the conclusions
(in 120 words or less)
First contact
Shows up in PsycInfo
Gets skimmed before reading the article

13. The anatomy of a research article
Introduction - gives you the background that you need
What are the issues
What is/are the theory(ies)
What does the past research say
What the rationale for doing this research
What are the specific hypotheses
Reading checklist
1) What is the author's goal?
2) What are the hypotheses?
3) If you had designed the experiment, how would YOU have done it?

14. The anatomy of a research article
Method - tells the reader exactly what was done
Enough detail that the reader could actually replicate the study.
Subsections:
Participants - who were the data collected from
Apparatus/ Materials - what was used to conduct the study
Procedure - how the study was conducted, what the participants did
Reading checklist
1 a) Is your method better than theirs?
b) Does the authors method actually test the hypotheses?
c) What are the independent, dependent, and control variables?
2) Based on what the authors did, what results do YOU expect?

15. The anatomy of a research article
Results - gives a summary of the results and the statistical tests
Reading checklist
1) Did the author get unexpected results?
2 a) How does the author interpret the results?
b) How would YOU interpret the results?
c) What implications would YOU draw from these results?

16. The anatomy of a research article
Discussion - the interpretation and implications of the results
Reading checklist
1 a) Does YOUR interpretation or the authors' interpretation best represent the data?
b) Do you or the author draw the most sensible implications and conclusions?
References - full citations of all work cited
Appendices - additional supplementary supporting material

17. Next Week
Download and read the Strayer & Johnston (2001) article for lab next week
Have a good Labor Day
See you on Wednesday