Literature Review: 'Mother Article Hunting' as Compulsory Preliminary Technique

Certainly, there are many ways to do a literature review.
And of course, there is no one model that fits all conditions.

The following guide is what I normally use when reviewing the literature. It's a preliminary step before you actually head on to start the reviewing process. 

Perhaps you have other ways, please share!
(Note: this article is best read with this article: https://norlizakushairi.blogspot.com/2019/05/according-to-guna-jangan-sembarangan.html)

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When you do a literature search 📖for your literature review, one important part is to search for the original article or known as 'mother article'💎. 

Most of the students tend to forget the importance of tracing the original guru(s) or sifu of the field whereby the ideas were originated or emerged while reviewing takes place. They simply cited and used the word "According to XXX' while XXX is not even a guru or scholar in that field. 

To avoid this situation, you can follow the following steps proposed.

Why we need to be cautious about this matter?

The answer is simple and logical: By tracing the mother article(s), you give justice to the flow of historical development of one's idea as you allow yourself to appreciate those pioneers who contributed to that particular field. 

Here are the steps you can follow when searching for the mother article during your literature review. 

Steps:

1. Let's say our objective in the review is to find the definition of Flipped Classroom (FC) or Flipped Learning (FL)

2. Skim all the potential articles and focus on the parts where the particular information that you need is given by the authors. Let's name this article as A, B, C, D, and E.

3. Spot the place where the authors of A-E's articles mention a significant statement pertaining to your query (Figure 1).

Figure 1: Showing Article A mentioning 'potential mother article'

 

4.   Let's say that in these articles (A-E) that we are reviewing, the name of Strayer appears so many times when authors refer to the definition of Flipped Classroom

5.   At this point, we may mark "Strayer" as the "potential mother article(s)"

But we have to really make sure that we do it correctly (deciding that Strayer is the mother article), so the process needs to be repeated.

6. Now in articles A-E, go to the Bibliography section, and find the articles by Strayer. In these articles by Strayer, he mentions and cited a few more names backdated earlier than his studies where he based his arguments.

7. Let's say we found two articles written by Strayer. We shall name the articles by Strayer as F and G.

8. Now, in Strayer's articles, do a backward trace by referring to the Bibliography section.  We are repeating the steps in 3-6 here (Figure 2).

Figure 2

9. Repeat process 3-8, until you find a few names that keep appearing repeatedly and consistently whenever the concept and definition of Flipped Learning is discussed. At this point, we may also find how the idea of flipped learning first emerged and coined. So, these are the original or the mother articles where the idea of FL concepts emerged. We may also initially infer that the authors of those articles are the sifus or gurus in this area.

Note: 

📌1. This method is to ensure that we do not simply jump into a proposed idea by the latter researchers by merely citing their names, ignoring the original scholars proposing the ideas in the first place.

📌2. This is to ensure that the ethic of research is adhered to. And what is more important, you will be abreast of the historical development of the particular idea, theory or model and subsequently, this makes you more well-versed in reviewing the issue at hand.

📌3. This whole process sounds tedious but if you really walk through these steps, it's just as easy as A, B, C.

📌4. Practice makes perfect🎉✅

Figure 3: The whole process of searching for 'mother article'

Note: 

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