How to Collect Data in a Thesis (Complete Guide to Thesis Literature Data Collection Methods)

A review is a common genre in scientific literature and a main component of secondary literature. Its primary purpose is to quickly comment on new knowledge in a developing field and to analyze or evaluate recent literature discussing the subject. Typically, before conducting scientific research, researchers need to consult a large amount of relevant literature, even forming a review, as necessary preparation and foundation for initiating research. Below, quillbot combines its own experience to discuss the collection and organization of materials for writing review articles.

Collecting literature is the foundation of writing a good review; the quantity and quality of literature directly affect the quality of the review. There are two principles for collecting materials: first, domestic before international, meaning first collect and organize domestic related work to understand the current research status and development history in a certain field domestically, then consult foreign related literature to understand international dynamics and frontiers, thus comprehensively grasping effective information and avoiding issues like overgeneralization; second, recent before distant, using subject headings or keywords to search for relevant Chinese and English literature, and尽可能 consulting and citing the latest literature.

Literature collection should strive to obtain original papers, experimental reports, technical summaries, patents, and related reviews, abstracts, etc. The collected materials should have the following characteristics: first, the focus of material selection should be on new materials; second, emphasize the authority of the materials; third, select materials that are representative and typical; fourth, appropriately cite some materials with different viewpoints. When collecting materials,尽可能 identify the authors, as the level of the author often determines the scientific and authoritative nature of the article.

After collecting materials, read and organize them, discarding the rough and selecting the fine. By establishing reasonable classification standards, screen, organize, and arrange materials, and according to the initially set theme, compare and distinguish materials,筛选出新颖、典型、精当的资料详细阅读. Generally, priority should be given to reading the latest published literature, reviews by more prestigious experts, important international and domestic academic conference papers, etc.

Generally, reading literature should achieve the following purposes: first, fully understand relevant research results within the research field; second, analyze the research methods and results of different authors, and whether their logical reasoning and analysis interpretation of the results are correct, etc. For similar experimental studies, when results from different authors conflict, reasons should be sought from the research experimental design, methods, conditions, etc., to decide取舍.

Although the completion of a review article relies on a large amount of materials, it is by no means a mere listing or accumulation of literature materials, but a re-creation. When organizing materials, according to the needs of the review article, make title indexes, summaries, or excerpts of the original literature, clearly sort through a large amount of literature, and make full preparation for the writing of the review article.