write a ‘compare and contrast’ style essay comparing the literature reviews of the papers, the methods used in the papers, the findings in the papers, and the strengths and weaknesses of the papers.
Your essay is to be 3000 words and it should be structured as follows but it is up to you whether you want to use additional subheadings and how you wish to allocate words per section.
Introduction
Discuss the context of the papers and provide a general outline of the topic of each paper.
Evaluating sources
Discuss how the authors approach reviewing the literature. Do any of the papers stand out for providing contextual information? Do all of the papers rely on the same body of literature?
Methods
Consider the research questions or topics of the papers: which paper’s papers methods are most suited to accessing the central question or topic? Are there any weaknesses to the research design or methods used?
Discussion/Findings
Address how well the papers discuss their findings. Are you convinced by what the authors write? Do their findings answer their research questions?
Conclusion
Here, evaluate which paper you think is strongest—remember, this may not be the paper with the ‘best’ findings but the one that uses the methods most consistently and answers the research question.
Remember: the aim of this assignment is to critically evaluate the given research papers, however, you are expected to draw on other literature (particularly methods, design and ethics literature) to justify your critique.
