EC831 Research Project
Lecture 2 – Project Structure and Literature
Review
Marco Francesconi
University of Essex
AU 2022, Essex
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Outline of This Lecture
Types of project
Typical project structure
Literature review
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Types of Project
1 Empirical Project: where you use data and econometrics (e.g.,
regression analysis) to analyse your question (common)
2 Theoretical Project: where you develop your own theoretical
model to analyse your question (hard and less common)
3 Extended Literature Survey: where you review the relevant
literature on your topic in detail (you can also add basic data
analysis, like graphs, which others have done) (common)
4 Case Study Project: where you use specific case studies to
analyse your question (you can also add basic data analysis, like
graphs, which others have done) (common)
5 A project containing any combination of the above
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Structure of the EC831 Project (1)
The basic structure of a project will have the following parts:
(1) In the first page you have the title and your name (that’s easy)
(2) Abstract (this is a short section, where you summarize your
main objectives and results (～ 100-200 words))
(3) Introduction (this is your first section (numbered), where you
present your topic, explain why it is important, give an idea of
what we still do not know (which motivates your dissertation),
and provide a very short summary of your main results
(4) Literature Review (this is a title of another section – see below)
(5) Main Body (Note: this is not a title of a section and contains
your main bulk of work, e.g., theoretical considerations, data,
samples, empirical results, etc.). It may contain more than one
section
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Structure of the EC831 Project (2)
(6) Conclusion (this is a title of a section, which concludes your
work and where you present again your main results and link
back to the theme you opened up in the Introduction)
(7) References (this is a title of a section, which you do not need to
number – See later)
(8) In the case of Empirical Projects or Case Studies (or other types
of project), you may have tables or figures (with elaboration of
your data, results, etc.). This material may go in the text OR at
the end and in order, Table 1, Table 2, etc. and Figure 1, Figure
2, etc. as they are named in the dissertation
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Structure of the EC831 Project (3)
Most of the scientific papers in economics you will see have a
similar structure
In many of these papers, the Literature Review is part of the
Introduction, so it is not a separate section (as we said above)
In your case, you may want to keep a separate section (titled
Literature Review), just after your Introduction. But it is your
choice to embed this into the Introduction if you prefer
During these lectures we will look at each element of this
structure separately
The main difference among the different projects will mainly be
the “Main Body”. We will look at this closely
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Literature Review
This is the first thing you have to write
It is very important, because if informs you on:
(a) what others have done already on your topic (what we know)
(b) what to do in your project (your contribution) (Different
data/countries Different analysis Different approach
Different case studies etc.) → Project Plan
(c) how to write the project (you need to write in a scientific
manner, similar to the papers you read for the literature review)
Literature Review: max 1,500 words
Project Plan: max 200 words
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Purpose of the Literature Review
Why do we need a literature review
To show your readers that you know the literature, using the
appropriate and relevant references
To educate yourself (and your readers) about the literature,
explaining well what other have already found
Bottom line: You need to know what is known before you can
make a contribution
To motivate your work, and so to provide a possible “rationale” for
your contribution to the literature, you may want to say something
like:
“The literature has focused on ‘this’ and ‘that’. There is no
consensus on this important question (i.e., your topic). This
dissertation will shed light on (the issue), using ‘xxx’ (e.g., an
economic hypothesis coming from theory) and ‘yyy’ (e.g., your
data)….”
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Where to Find the Relevant Literature
Google Scholar: https://scholar.google.co.uk/
There you find (almost) everything you need: good/bad articles
published in good/bad journals, unpublished working papers,
reports, books, etc.
You will not be able to access every article you find in Google
Scholar
However, through the University of Essex’s Library you will be
able to access most of them
Another relevant source is JSTOR (which you can access
through the Library): http://www.jstor.org/
In any case, through Google Scholar you should to be able to
find most of the results that you get in other academic search
engines
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How to Find the Relevant Literature (1)
Search (on Google Scholar) for the “right” keywords that are
in your title. Try the keywords, and then try some more
Through Google Scholar you can see the citations of an article
(i.e. how many times it has been cited). The more citation, the
higher quality (in general)
By clicking on the citations you can see all the items (articles,
books, working papers, chapters, reports) that have cited that
particular paper
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How to Find the Relevant Literature (2)
The Journal of Economic Perspectives (JEP) (available on
JSTOR in the Library) is a good outlet for articles that provide a
broad, non-technical overview of a topic
Another good source of general articles on a topic is the Journal
of Economic Literature (JEL) (available on JSTOR)
Each paper you find will have a list of references at the end.
Look at them and see if there is anything relevant for your topic
(new sources)
Each paper has a literature review (normally in the Introduction
or as a separate section). There, you can see what the paper
says about other papers that may be relevant for you as well
(relevant information)
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How Many Articles in Your Review (1)
Try to focus on scientific articles (i.e. research papers),
possibly published in “good” economic journals
Which journals Too many to list here, but: American Economic Review,
Quarterly Journal of Economics, Journal of Political Economy, Review of Economic Studies, Econometrica,
Economic Journal, Journal of the European Economic Association, Review of Economics and Statistics, Journal of
Monetary Economics, Journal of Financial Economics, American Economic Journals (Micro, Macro, Applied,
Policy), European Economic Review, Journal of Labor Economics, Rand Journal of Economics, Journal of Public
Economics, Journal of Health Economics, Journal of Development Economics, Journal of International Economics,
Economica, Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Journal of Industrial Economics, Journal of Economic
Behavior and Organization, International Economic Review, Journal of Economic Theory, Scandinavian Journal of
Economics, Management Science, Journal of Urban Economics, Journal of Applied Econometrics, Journal of
Money, Credit and Banking, Journal of Finance, JEP, JEL, are just few examples
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How Many Articles in Your Review (2)
Books can be useful, especially for some topics, but academic
articles are probably easiest for your literature review
For some topics, there will be more references (in terms of
academic articles) than others. Be aware of that
There is no general rule, BUT you should have AT LEAST 5
academic articles cited and discussed in your literature review.
Normally it will be more than that (say, between 8 and 15) but
no less than 5
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How to Read Academic Articles (1)
Unfortunately, many academic papers in economics and finance
can be highly technical, long (and boring)
However, all articles have:
(a) a Title: which tells you if the article can be relevant for your
topic
(b) an Abstract: a short summary of what the authors do and find
in the own work
(c) an Introduction: a non-technical summary of what they do
(their research aim and the intuition of how they do it) and the
relevant literature cited in the paper (or some of it)
(d) a Conclusion: a (generally) non-technical summary of their
results
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How to Read Academic Articles (2)
1 Read title and abstract: If you sense the paper is relevant for
your topic, read more
2 Should you decide to read more: Read the Introduction. That
should be enough to give you the main idea of the paper and
understand what the authors did, without going into much detail
3 If the paper is particularly relevant: Read the main sections of
the paper (after the Introduction). Pay special attention to
Tables and Figures
4 Only read an entire paper if it is very relevant for your topic.
Again, expect something around 3–5 of such papers (do discuss
this with your supervisor)
5 As you read through the Abstract, Introduction, Conclusion etc.:
take notes
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Taking Notes on What (1)
For each paper take notes about:
(a) what the authors do in the paper. For example: they look at
how government expenditure affects economic growth in
developing countries
(b) how they do their analysis (i.e. which methodology): empirical
(using data, regressions…), theoretical (i.e. by developing a
theoretical model), using case studies (which ones ), etc.
(c) what they find (i.e. their main result or results)
(d) strengths and weaknesses of the paper: You can discover those
by reading the introduction of other papers which cite that
paper!
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Taking Notes on What (2)
(a), (b) and (c) can be normally found in the Abstract, Introduction,
and Conclusion of each paper
Normally you do not need to write very much about every paper you
read.
But for some relevant papers, you may want to write more and go
into greater detail
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How to Structure Your Literature Review
Use your notes and look for:
(a) Is the chronological development of ideas (from the older to
the most recent paper) important In some cases yes, but in
others this may not the case
(b) Do authors agree with one another in their
results/conclusions Or do they disagree Why
(c) Do they use the same model The same methodology The
same data The same country The same time period
Based on (a)–(c), you can figure out what the literature on your
topic is about and you can structure your own literature review
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Potential Organising Principles
Model/Methodology: theoretical perspective, empirical
framework, identification strategy, etc.
Papers that agree with one another
Papers that disagree with one another
Geographical focus: e.g., developing countries, developed, less
developed, a particular country like the UK or US
Time period (in the past, more recent periods)
Data sources and sample selection: some may have used
cross-sectional data, others longitudinal; some may have
dropped specific groups of population (e.g., men) or focused on
others (e.g., ethnic minorities)
Chronological (early contributions versus more recent papers)
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Looking again at the Structure (1)
You would like to start your literature review with a general
paragraph on the topic
Examples:
(a) Ever since Harrod’s (1948) discussion of “hump savings” economists have
recognized the importance of saving during working years for consumption
during retirement (taken from Feldstein (1974) Social Security, Induced
Retirement and Aggregate Capital Accumulation)
(b) A fundamental question in growth theory asks whether an increase in
government expenditure promotes economic growth. This relationship has
been a major subject of debate among economists and, as we will show, the
relevant literature on this topic does not reveal any strong consensus,
therefore leading to possible inconsistent results (taken from an Essex UG
student’s dissertation in 2018-19)
Those initial paragraphs simply state that the topic is relevant and
that the literature has looked into it
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Looking again at the Structure (2)
After the initial paragraph you need to tell the “story” of the
literature you have read (this is where you use your notes)
You should then finish with a final paragraph where you
summarise the main points of the literature your reviewed
At the very end, you have a list of References (i.e. the list of
the papers you cited in your review) in alphabetical order by
authors’ surname
The style we use for references in the reference list is Harvard
Style: http://www.citethisforme.com/harvard-referencing
Example:
Engle, R. F. and Granger, C. W. J. (1987). Co-integration and Error
Correction: Representation, Estimation and Testing. Econometrica, 55 (2),
pp. 251–276.
In practice: Last name, First (given) name initials. (Year of
publication). Article title. Journal, Volume (Issue), Page(s).
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How to Write Up Your Literature Review
A well written Literature Review should FLOW: if you write your
review like a shopping list then you are doing it wrong!
Many students have a tendency to report the results of others.
This is not enough. Remember, you are telling a “story” and
explaining where/how other work fits into yours will help tell
your story
Simple tips for making the writing more fluent (use those words
to link consecutive paragraphs about the papers you review):
(a) Similarity: also, again, in addition to, additionally, similar to,
similarly, like, agree, agrees with, etc.
(b) Disagreement: contradicts, opposite to, differs, on the other
hand, disagree, disagrees with, unlike, however, etc.
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Final Comments
The best way to understand how to write academically is by
reading papers! In particular, how other authors write about
the literature (normally in the introduction of the paper)
Avoid long sentences
You can use “I” (I will review the relevant literature on…) or
“we” (we will review…). In economics “we” is also used by
single authors, but it is not a rule
Do not quote too much using ”…”. Try to paraphrase (use your
own words to explain a particular paper). But do avoid
plagiarism! Remember the notes in Lecture 1
Look at different examples: the papers you read, the Essex
Economics Student Journal, etc.
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