Research Guides: Literature Reviews: Social & Behavioral Sciences

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Literature Reviews: Social & Behavioral Sciences

Literature reviews in social and behavioral sciences can be organized in various ways. You can organize and write about the literature you are reviewing in different ways, by:

Chronological - publication date to demonstrate your topic's development over time.
Methodological - research methods (qualitative/quantitative) or type of research (theoretical/empirical).
Thematic - your topic's discrete themes or main ideas.

When you're reviewing your topic's literature, you can ask yourself:

Which main ideas or questions keep recurring in articles?
Does this article support, mention, or refute my topic's ideas or questions?

When writing, make sure you both summarize and synthesize the articles you're including in your literature review.

Social & Behavioral Sciences Databases

Because there are so many areas of study within social & behavioral sciences, you may find it useful to search our database list by Subject to identify useful places to begin your literature review. Not sure where to start? Chat or request a research appointment!

UofM University Libraries Database Search
Search by name of database (like JSTOR) or use the dropdown menu to browse databases by subject.

A few databases to get you started:

ERIC
Open access version of ERIC, indexing journal and non-journal literature in the field of education; includes books, journal articles, ERIC Digests, policy papers, conference papers, technical reports. Coverage: 1966- .
Gender Studies Collection
This collection of journals aims to provide balanced coverage of this significant aspect of our culture, covering such topics as gender studies, family and marital issues, health aspects, and many more.
Humanities Source Ultimate
Indexes periodicals in archaeology, art, classics, film, folklore, journalism, linguistics, music, the performing arts, philosophy, religion, world history, and world literature. Coverage: citations & abstracts, 1907- ; select full text, 1994-.
JSTOR
The JSTOR database consists of complete backfiles of core scholarly journals in all disciplines. Coverage: varies--going back to first year of publication and coming up to 3-5 years ago. See the Project Muse database for scholarly articles from within the past 3-5 years.
Nexis Uni
Nexis Uni features more than 15,000 news, business and legal sources from LexisNexis®—including U.S. Supreme Court decisions dating back to 1790—with an intuitive interface that offers quick discovery across all content types, personalization features such as Alerts and saved searches and a collaborative workspace with shared folders and annotated documents.
Project MUSE
Provides access to the full text of more than 200 scholarly journals in many disciplines, including: African studies, anthropology, education, history, music, literature, philosophy, psychology, sociology, and more. Coverage: varies, typically the past 3-5 years.
PsycInfo
Citations to and summaries of journal articles, book chapters, books, and technical reports, as well as citations to dissertations, in psychology, plus psychological aspects in related disciplines (medicine, psychiatry, nursing, sociology, education, pharmacology, physiology, linguistics, anthropology, business, and law). Journal coverage, spanning 1887-present, includes international material selected from more than 1,300 periodicals written in over 25 languages. Coverage: 1632-present.

Advanced Search Strategies: PsychInfo from University Libraries on Vimeo.
Social Sciences Full Text
Indexes periodicals in addiction studies, anthropology, area studies, communications & mass media, community health & medical care, corrections, criminal justice, criminology, economics, environmental studies, ethics, family studies, gender studies, geography, gerontology, international relations, law, minority studies, planning & public administration, policy sciences, political science, psychiatry, psychology, public welfare, social work, sociology, and urban studies. Coverage: citations & abstracts, 1983- ; full text, 1995-.

eBooks

Writing Literature Reviews: A Guide for Students of the Social and Behavioral Sciences (eBook) by Jose L. Galvan; Melisa C. Galvan
Publication Date: 2017

This useful guide educates students in the preparation of literature reviews for term projects, theses, and dissertations. The authors provide numerous examples from published reviews that illustrate the guidelines discussed throughout the book.
A Practical Guide to Dissertation and Thesis Writing (eBook) by Ian Smith, Mark Stephan Felix
Publication Date: 2019

This book provides a step-by-step guide to writing the different chapters of a PhD dissertation, which will benefit aspiring, beginner and mid-track PhD students and candidates in the Social Sciences. Based on the authors'combined experience of working with both Masters and PhD students through the dissertation writing process, it offers helpful writing guidelines, from the conceptualization and problematization of the dissertation through to the literature review, methodological issues, writing up results and, finally, to the discussion, conclusions and abstract writing process.

More Resources

Knopf, J. W. - Doing a Literature Review
Knopf, J. W. (2006). Doing a Literature Review. PS: Political Science & Politics, 39(1), 127–132. doi:10.1017/S1049096506060264
Randolph, J. J. - A Guide to Writing the Dissertation Literature Review
Randolph, J. J. (2009). A Guide to Writing the Dissertation Literature Review. Practical Assessment, Research & Evaluation, 14(13).
Rocco, T. S., & Plakhotnik, M. S. - Literature reviews, conceptual frameworks, and theoretical frameworks: Terms, functions, and distinctions
Rocco, T. S., & Plakhotnik, M. S. (2009). Literature reviews, conceptual frameworks, and theoretical frameworks: Terms, functions, and distinctions. Human Resource Development Review, 8(1), 120–130. https://doi.org/10.1177/1534484309332617
Organizing Your Social Sciences Research Paper: The Literature Review
USC Libraries' comprehensive research guide on social & behavioral sciences literature reviews.
Campbell Systematic Reviews
An open access journal publishing systematic reviews, evidence and gap maps, and methods research papers.

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McWherter Library Research Appointments
Need help with literature review? Want to make sure what you are proposing has not been done? The Research Librarians are here to help.