Thanks for the good post! I especially liked the recommended questions:
1. The goal for your literature review should be to identify the problem that your project will solve. Your project might either aim to solve a new problem, or improve on an existing method. 2. Use the literature review to identify *gaps* in the literature: What do we not yet know? 3. What are the shortcomings of existing methods to solve the problem? Why are current approaches not yet useful in practice? What is the bottleneck?
I personally like to write literature reviews or related works sections for my papers, and I approach it that way. I am basically trying to place what I did or what I want to do in contrast with what has already been done, so that reader not familiar with the specifics can gauge the value of the work. There’s an element of filtering the papers for the only ones that are relevant, while trying to maintain some objectivity and not piss people without intending to (important!)
Another advice I find useful is to ask for feedback on the lit review to collaborators and other researchers you know in the field. That’s basically what happens during a good peer-review, where the reviewer will usually recommend you papers if they think you are missing important references.
Thanks for the good post!
I especially liked the recommended questions:
I personally like to write literature reviews or related works sections for my papers, and I approach it that way. I am basically trying to place what I did or what I want to do in contrast with what has already been done, so that reader not familiar with the specifics can gauge the value of the work. There’s an element of filtering the papers for the only ones that are relevant, while trying to maintain some objectivity and not piss people without intending to (important!)
Another advice I find useful is to ask for feedback on the lit review to collaborators and other researchers you know in the field. That’s basically what happens during a good peer-review, where the reviewer will usually recommend you papers if they think you are missing important references.