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Business Research Methods, Chapter 2: Getting started: Reviewing the literature

Instructions: For each question, click on the radio button beside your answer. When you have completed the entire quiz, click the Submit my answers button at the bottom of the page to receive your results.

Question 1:


a) It helps develop a story line
b) It proves that a researcher is knowledgeable in their chosen area
c) It shows that there are unanswered questions in a researcher’s area of research
d) All of the above

Question 2:


a) keep detailed reference of the full publication information of anything that you read
b) be critical while reading
c) take good notes to jot down any ideas that occur to you during the reading process
d) All of the above

Question 3:


a) The literature review shows why research questions are important
b) It is important to get everything a researcher has read into the literature review
c) Students should continue the research for and reading of the relevant literature throughout the whole research process
d) A literature review helps researchers to build up an argument

Question 4:


a) It is a very transparent approach
b) It is used by quantitative as well as qualitative researchers
c) It provides a more reliable foundation on how to design research because it is based on a more comprehensive understanding of the subject
d) The systematic review is concerned with trying to understand the effects of a particular variable or intervention which has been found in previous studies

Question 5:


a) Post-positivist researchers want to enrich the human discourse. Therefore, by conducting a literature review they want to gain an initial impression of the topic area that they intend to understand through their research.
b) They want to gain detailed knowledge of their research field and conduct a systematic review to do so
c) They want to find out what their research project can add to existing knowledge in their research field
d) All of the above

Question 6:


a) To avoid plagiarism and to acknowledge within the literature review the various sources used which have contributed to the subject area
b) The supervisor wants to know if the student cited the major article
c) Researchers wants to be cited in as many publications as possible
d) None of the above

Question 7:


a) The act of passing off a thesis as new when the argument has been used elsewhere
b) To use another person’s words, ideas, thoughts, as one’s own
c) To use another person’s inventions and designs as one’s own
d) All of the above

Question 8:


a) When researching, it is important to make careful notes of all sources
b) Avoid paraphrase whole sentences without putting them into quotation marks
c) When submitting your own work, be sure to acknowledge the ideas that have been explored by others
d) All of the above

Question 9:


a) A summary of all literature which was ever published in the field under investigation
b) A researcher’s initial impression of a topic, which will be more fully understood as the research progresses
c) A historically based review that intends to give an overview of the development of a certain topic
d) All of the above