Business Research
Methods
Chapter 3 - Literature Review
and Hypothesis Formulation
Topics to be discussed
• Need for literature review
• Sources of literatures
• Methods of reviewing literatures
• Conceptual framework
• Conceptualization and operationalization
• Hypothesis formulation
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 2
What is a “Literature
Review”?
• “…a literature review surveys scientific articles,
books, journals, dissertations and other sources
relevant to a particular issue, area of research, or
theory, providing a description, summary, and
critical evaluation of each work.”
• A literature review may constitute an essential
chapter of a thesis or dissertation, or may be a self-
contained review of writings on a subject.
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 3
Objective of a Lit. Review
• Not to rack up points by listing as many
articles as possible
• Demonstrate an intellectual ability to recognize
relevant information, and to synthesize and
evaluate it according to the guiding concept
• Your reader not only wants to know what
literature exists, but also your informed
evaluation of the literature.
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 4
Objective of a Lit. Review …
• Two sets of skills are required:
– Information seeking: the ability to scan the
literature efficiently to identify a set of
potentially useful articles and books
– Critical appraisal: the ability to apply principles
of analysis to identify those studies which are
unbiased and valid. Your readers want more
just than a descriptive list of articles and books
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 5
Procedures for reviewing
the literature
There are five steps involved in conducting a
literature review:
• Search for existing literature in your area of
study;
• Review the literature selected;
• Develop a theoretical framework;
• Develop a conceptual framework;
• Writing up the literature reviewed
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 6
Defining the scope of the
review
• You should try to include research-based literature
• Other theoretical works that focus upon the
discourses, conceptual frameworks and models
specific to your topic should be included
• You may also include ‘grey literature’ (published
outside of scholarly journals) e.g. commissioned
reports, organisational project papers etc
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 7
Identifying the sources
• Inclusion criteria:
– Time frame, e.g. 1995-2000
– Language or national context
– Main focus of paper
– Explicit methodology and outcomes
• Exclusion criteria:
– These may be dependent on your focus, field of
study, rigour or applicability to practice
(generalisability).
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 8
Sources of Literature
Journal articles:
• These are good sources, especially for up-to-date
information.
• They are frequently used in literature reviews because they
offer a relatively concise, up-to-date format for research.
• Depending on the publication, these materials may be
refereed (peer reviewed) materials.
• A peer reviewed journal requires that, prior to publication,
submitted articles be approved by a board of reviewers
and/or peers in the subject area in order to evaluate the
quality, validity and reliability of the article.
9
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD)
What about Non-refereed Journals?
• Non-refereed materials such as Trade Journals, or
magazines use less rigorous standards of
screening prior to publication.
• Non-refereed materials may not be checked as
intensely as refereed materials, but many can still
be considered useful, although not for scientific
literature and research.
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 10
Sources of Literature (cont.)
Books: remember that books tend to be less up-
to-date, as it takes longer for a book to be
published than for a journal article.
• They are still likely to be useful for including in
your literature review as they offer a good
starting point from which to find more detailed
and up-to-date sources of information.
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 11
Sources of Literature (cont.)
• Conference proceedings: are a collection of technical
papers presented at a professional association meeting.
• These meetings are sometimes referred to as conferences,
symposia, workshops, expositions, exhibitions, and the
like.
• Depending on the criticality of the panel, proceedings
may be as good as referred journals
• They are also helpful in providing information about
people in different research areas, and so can be helpful
in tracking down other work by the same researchers.
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 12
Sources of Literature (cont.)
Government/corporate reports:
• Many government departments and corporations
commission carry out research.
• Their published findings can provide a useful
source of information, depending on your field of
study.
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 13
Sources of Literature (cont.)
Theses and dissertations: these can be useful sources
of information. However there are disadvantages:
• They can be difficult to obtain since they are not
published, but are generally only available from the
library or interlibrary systems
• The student who carried out the research may not be
an experienced researcher and therefore you might
have to treat their findings with more caution than
published research.
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 14
Sources of Literature (cont.)
Internet: the fastest-growing source of information is
on the Internet.
• Bear in mind that anyone can post information on
the Internet so the quality may not be reliable.
• The information you find may be intended for a
general audience and so not be suitable for
inclusion in your literature review (information for
a general audience is usually less detailed).
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 15
In assessing each piece,
consideration should be given to:
• Provenance - What are the author's credentials? Are the
author's arguments supported by evidence (e.g. primary
historical material, case studies, narratives, statistics,
recent scientific findings)?
• Objectivity - Is the author's perspective even-handed or
prejudicial? Is contrary data considered or is certain
pertinent information ignored to prove the author's point?
• Persuasiveness - is the author's thesis convincing?
• Value - Does the work ultimately contribute significantly
to an understanding of the subject of my research?
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 16
Working with Literature
Working with
Literature
Find it! Manage it! Use it! Review it!
Knowing the Reading Choosing your Understanding the
literature types efficiently research topic lit review’s purpose
Using available Keeping track Developing Ensuring adequate
resources of references your question coverage
Sharpen your Writing relevant Arguing your Writing
search skills annotations rationale purposefully
Informing your Working on
work with theory style and tone
Designing
method
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 17
Types of literature review
• Narrative
• Systematic
• Scoping
• Argumentative
• Integrative
• Theoretical
– Lets see them one by one
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 18
Narrative literature review
• It is a traditional literature review, critiques literature
and summarizes the body of a literature.
• Narrative review also draws conclusions about the
topic and identifies gaps or inconsistencies in a
body of knowledge.
• You need to have a sufficiently focused research
question to conduct a narrative literature review
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 19
Systematic literature review
• It is more rigorous and well-defined approach
compared to most other types of literature review.
• Systematic literature review is comprehensive and
details the timeframe within which the literature was
selected.
• Systematic literature review can be divided into two
categories: meta-analysis and meta-synthesis.
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 20
Systematic literature review
• In meta-analysis you take findings from several
studies on the same subject and analyze these
using standardized statistical procedures.
• In meta-analysis patterns and relationships are
detected and conclusions are drawn.
• Meta-analysis is associated with deductive
research approach.
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 21
Systematic literature review
• Meta-synthesis, on the other hand, is based on
non-statistical techniques.
• This technique integrates, evaluates and interprets
findings of multiple qualitative research studies.
• Meta-synthesis literature review is conducted
usually when following inductive research
approach.
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 22
Scoping literature review
• As implied by its name is used to identify the scope
or coverage of a body of literature on a given topic.
• The main difference between systematic and
scoping types of literature review is that, systematic
literature review is conducted to find answer to more
specific research questions, whereas scoping
literature review is conducted to explore more
general research question.
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 23
Argumentative literature
review
• Examines literature selectively in order to
support or refute an argument, deeply imbedded
assumption, or philosophical problem already
established in the literature.
• It should be noted that a potential for bias is a
major shortcoming associated with
argumentative literature review.
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 24
Integrative literature review
• Critiques, and synthesizes secondary data about
research topic in an integrated way such that
new frameworks and perspectives on the topic
are generated.
• If your research does not involve primary data
collection and data analysis, then using
integrative literature review will be your only
option.
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 25
Theoretical literature review
• Focuses on a pool of theory that has accumulated in
regard to an issue, concept, theory, phenomena.
• Theoretical literature reviews play an instrumental
role in establishing what theories already exist, the
relationships between them, to what degree existing
theories have been investigated, and to develop
new hypotheses to be tested.
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 26
Thesis?
• Depends on the guideline of the
institution but usually covers:
– Theoretical literature review
– Empirical literature review
– Summary and literature gap
– Conceptual framework
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 27
Laundry List Syndrome
➢ One common literature review problem is creating a list of
information by author, without a critical assessment,
commonly referred to as a “laundry list”
➢ In presenting your literature review, organize your ideas
topically and add critical commentary.
➢ Reviewing a literature is not just summarizing, a well-written
literature review:
✓ Organizes literature
✓ Evaluates literature
✓ Identifies patterns and trends in literature
✓ Synthesizes literature
28
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD)
Points to note
• Have I accurately represented the author’s views?
• Is source material research current and relevant to
thesis topic?
• Is there a clear connection between thesis topic
and the LR?
• Are all sources documented accurately?
• Have I used effective transitions from idea to idea,
source to source, paragraph to paragraph?
• Have I represented all conflicts or argumentative
sides fairly?
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 29
Conceptual framework
• A written or visual presentation that:
– “explains either graphically, or in narrative
form, the main things to be studied – the key
factors, concepts or variables -
– and the presumed relationship among them”.
• The conceptual framework stems from the
theoretical framework and concentrates, usually,
on one section of that theoretical framework which
becomes the basis of analysis.
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 30
Developing conceptual …
Developing your conceptual framework requires five
main steps:
1. Identifying the relevant concepts.
2. Defining those concepts.
3. Operationalising the concepts.
4. Identifying any moderating or intervening
variables.
5. Identifying the relationship between variables.
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 31
Forms of presentation
• Process frameworks
– Set out the stages through which an action
moves from initiation to conclusion. These
relate to the ‘how?’ question.
• Content frameworks
– Set out the variables, and possibly the
relationship (with relative strengths) between
them, that together answer the ‘why?’ question.
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 32
Possible ways of depicting
the framework
• The possibilities include:
– Flow charts.
– Tree diagrams.
– Shape based diagrams – triangles,
concentric circles, overlapping circles.
– Etc
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 33
Flow chart of innovation
decision making
PRIOR CONDITIONS
1. Previous practice
2. Felt needs/problems
3. Innovativeness
4. Norms of the social COMMUNICATION CHANNELS
system
1. KNOWLEDGE 2. PERSUASION 3. DECISION 4. IMPLEMENTATION 5. CONFIRMATION
Observations of the Perceived characteristics
decision making unit of innovation
1. Adoption Confirmed Adoption
1. Socio-economic 1. Relative advantage
Later Adoption
characteristics
2. Compatibility
Discontinuance
2. Personality
3. Complexity 2. Rejection
variables Continued Rejection
4. Trialability
3. Communication
behaviour 5. Observability
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 34
Tree diagram of changing
consumer behavior
Customers
Changing Product
customers expectations
Experience Values Lifestyles Demographics Quality Price Purchasing Information
Range Knowledge Priorities Health Access
Physical Service
Currency
Value Image
Loss of
Individuality Expectations Variety
loyalty
Age
composition
Ease Flexibility Security
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 35
Maslow’s triangle of need
Self actualization
Esteem
Affiliation
Security
Physiological
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 36
Conceptual framework (E.g.)
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 37
Conceptualization and
Concepts
• Conceptualization is a process of defining the agreed
meaning of the terms used in a study.
• Indicators are identified to mark the presence or
absence of a concept.
• Some concepts have more than one aspect or facet,
called dimensions.
• Eg. - Sustainability of MFIs
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 38
From Conceptualization to
Operationalization
• From conceptualization the researcher creates
a nominal definition to identify the focus of the
study.
• An operational definition is created to defined
the procedures or steps used in measuring a
concept.
• An operational definition must be specific and
unambiguous.
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 39
Operationalization
• The process of creating a definition(s) for a
concept that can be observed and measured
• The development of specific research procedures
that will result in empirical observations
• How fine must the measure indicate variation
between the attributes of a variable?
• Which dimensions are important to your study?
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 40
Hypothesis
• Under known facts of the problem, hypothesis is
forwarded to explain relationship between variables
• is a statement subject to verification
• a guess but experienced guess based on some facts
• A researcher calls these assumptions, assertions,
statements hypotheses and they become the basis of
an inquiry.
• In most cases, the hypothesis will be based upon
either previous studies or the researcher’s own or
someone else’s observations.
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 41
Characteristics
• Hypotheses has the following characteristics:
• A tentative proposition
• Unknown validity
• Specifies relation between two or more variables
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 42
Functions
• Bringing clarity to the research problem
• Serves the following functions
• Provides a study with focus
• Signifies what specific aspects of a research
problem is to investigate
• What data to be collected and what not to be collected
• Enhancement of objectivity of the study
• Formulate the theory
• Enable to conclude with what is true or what is false
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 43
Characteristics
• Simple, specific, and contextually clear
• Capable of verification
• Related to the existing body of knowledge
• Operationalisable
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 44
Types of hypothesis
• Three types
• Working hypothesis
• Null hypothesis
• Alternate hypothesis
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 45
Working hypothesis
• The working or trail hypothesis is provisionally
adopted to explain the relationship between some
observed facts for guiding a researcher in the
investigation of a problem.
• A Statement constitutes a trail or working hypothesis
(which) is to be tested and conformed, modifies or
even abandoned as the investigation proceeds.
• Example: Population influences the number of bank
branches in a town
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 46
Null hypothesis
• A null hypothesis is formulated against the working
hypothesis; opposes the statement of the working
hypothesis
• It is formulated to disprove the contrary of a working
hypothesis
• When a researcher rejects a null hypothesis, he/she
actually proves a working hypothesis
• Example: HO: population do not have any influence on the
number of bank branches in a town.
47
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD)
Alternate hypothesis
• An alternate hypothesis is formulated when a
researcher totally rejects null hypothesis
• The researcher develops such a hypothesis with
adequate reasons
• Example: H1: Population has significant effect on
the number of bank branches in a town.
• A researcher formulates this hypothesis only after
rejecting the null hypothesis.
Zenegnaw Abiy Hailu (PhD) 48
END