Doctoral candidates' information practice through research writing : cases of East-Asian students in Australian universities

Abstract

Information practices are pertinent to research writing, particularly in the writing of a literature review. This study examined East Asian doctoral (PhD) candidates' information practices as a construct in writing literature reviews for social science theses in Australian universities. The outcomes of this research complement and extend the current documented strategies and regulations in information practices in both fields of Higher Degree Research education and Library and Information Science (LIS). Conceptualised in terms of Foucauldian (1972) "statements", this study contributes to a reconceptualisation of information practices in research writing through the analysis of students' literature reviews. Further, this research sheds light on research pedagogy for researchers who are committed to being educators more than supervisors. For doctoral students this thesis provides in part a picture of information practices in research writing. Information practices in literature reviews have largely been under-researched and/or overlooked in the fields of LIS and research education. Past studies in these two areas have contributed to developing research students' information search abilities and writing abilities through various strategies (Carter, 2011a; Cotterall, 2011a; Kavuluru et al., 2012; Lee & Kamler, 2008; McCulloch et al., 2010; Olsson, 2010; Switzer & Lepkowski, 2007), while there is lack of combined investigation about information practices in research writing. Moreover, there are few studies investigating the statements (Foucault, 1972) per se in these two areas. Statement which is the core unit of discourse brings about the particular modalities of existence such as the information practices in research writing (Foucault, 1972). The investigation on statement can generate new insights into research writing by relating to information practices in both research education and LIS. The data collection and analysis for this study, therefore, was conducted using Foucault's (1972) "statement". This thesis began by reviewing various works on information practices in both research education and LIS to develop a working theorised framework for use in data collection and analysis. This framework was further developed through Foucault's (1972) ideas on the formation of objects, the formation of enunciative modalities, and the formation of concepts. Accordingly, the objects and elements in a literature review have been restructured, the ways to write a literature review in accordance with these objects have been explored, and relevant concepts used to inform the construction of a literature review have been reconfigured. This framework was tested through the data analysis on seven East Asian PhD students' literature reviews. These theses were written by East Asian PhD students who completed doctorates within the last ten years (2007-2011) in social sciences at Australian universities. Specifically, this study examined literature "coverage" and "use" in three areas of these PhD students' literature reviews, namely the review of subject vocabularies and topics; the review of research phenomena and variables, and the review of method-related information. A topic-based formulation of a literature review was proposed as the original contribution to knowledge made by this research. This formulation is composed of three key aspects. First, it is recommended that a comprehensive literature review includes discursive objects that are relevant to the review of subject vocabularies and topics, research phenomena and variables, and method-related information. Second, a sound literature review requires doctoral students to occupy many interrelating enunciative positions to speak about the objects in the review. Third, it is recommended that the key concepts of "relevance", "coherence", "criticality", and "creativity" should be operationalised in pedagogies for the formulation of a literature review as a whole. As a consequence of the research reported in this thesis, it is possible to offer an alternative perspective to that of research writing by conceiving research students' information practices in literature review writing. Pedagogically, this can prompt research students to ask probing questions about their information practices such as: "What things do I need to include in a literature review?" "How do I write about these things?" "Why do I have to write these things in this way rather than that way?" The overarching perspective on information practices in research writing explored in this thesis deepens and extends the present work on information practices in the areas of research education and LIS.

Date of Award	2015
Original language	English