Research & Methodology: Critical Review

28.04.22 - 22.05.22 (Week 5 - Week 7)
Chai Yi Xuan / 0346645 / B' Creative Media
Design Research & Methodology
Task 2 / Critical Review

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LECTURES

Writing a Critical Review

Writing a critical review is split into three parts:

1. Reading

When you find an article, first skim through it to figure if it is relevant to your research topic. Once you have determined that it fits, read it critically. Examine the structure of the article, their types of reasons/evidence used to support their conclusion, and if there are any underlying assumptions or theoretical framework.

2. Analyzing

These are the questions you should ask when you are analyzing the paper:

• Structure
  
• What type of text is it?
• What are the different sections and how do they fit together?
• Are any of the sections particularly effective?
  

• Methodology
  
• Is the research quantitative or qualitative?
• Does the methodology have any weaknesses?
• How does the design of the study address the hypothesis?
  

• Reasons/Evidence
  
• What sources does the author use?
• What types of reasoning are employed?
• What type of evidence is provided?
• Are there any gaps in the evidence?
  

• Conclusions
  
• Does the data support the conclusion drawn by the researcher(s)?
• Are other interpretations plausible?
• Are the conclusions dependent on a particular theoretical formulation?
• What does the work contribute to the field?
  

• Logic
  
• What assumptions does the author make?
• Does the author account for all of the data, or are portions left out?
• What alternative perspectives remain unconsidered?
• Are there any logical flaws in the construction of the argument?
  

3. Writing

There are two types of structures used for critical review:

First structure

Introduction

Overview of the text

Evaluation of the text

• Point 1
• Point 2
• Point 3
• Point 4....

Conclusion

Second structure

Introduction (with thesis)

Point 1: Explanation and evaluation

Point 2: Explanation and evaluation

Point 3: Explanation and evaluation

Conclusion

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INSTRUCTIONS

To-Do List:

Find 5 articles, read through and write a critical review

Week 5

I searched for articles that may be relevant to my research. It was a huge struggle— a lot of times the research paper talks about representation or video games separately. It took a long time to find what I want, and even then I still need more articles.

Week 6

I finally found 5 articles with the keywords relevant to my research. I read through them and made small notes with a summary of each section. I managed to go through three articles before class day. They helped shed some insight on the current situation when it comes to representation in video games.

Week 7

I read the remaining two articles for my research. I found that the articles focused more on the psychological aspects of representation rather than the physical aspects. While my proposal initially focuses on physical traits, reading through these articles seems helpful in terms of understanding what is considered a good representation of other races/ethnicity in video games.

Figure 1: Critical Review

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REFLECTIONS

My biggest challenge here is to find articles relevant to my research. I wasn't sure if my keywords is too broad, but I barely found an official paper about racial representation in video games. At least, the ones that range in between the 5-year time frame. Most of the papers in recent years are thesis papers, which are not valid for critical review. Again, I still prefer to read fiction books over articles. The articles took a lot of time for me to understand, and it took me even more time to write a critical review. The process was arduous and it's not something I want to do again.