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Speaker 1: If you're in a STEM field, chances are you'll need to read primary literature, also known as research articles. And unlike books, effectively and efficiently reading a research paper requires a nuanced and systematic approach. When I first started reading research papers as a neuroscience major in college, it took considerable effort and time to make sense of it all. But since then, I've read through thousands of papers, published dozens of my own in peer-reviewed journals, and can now crank through them with ease. Here's the system I use. Dr. Jubbal, MedSchoolInsiders.com. First, determine the purpose of reading. Depending on the purpose and your goal in reading a research paper, your approach may differ considerably. Keep that in mind as we cover the following sections. If you're reading a paper as a requirement for class, like I initially had to for my neuroscience courses, you will be focusing on comprehension rather than on determining utility. You'll need to know the study hypothesis, the methods they used, the findings, and the limitations of their conclusions. As you proceed with your medical training, you will likely write many of your own research articles. After all, doing so is one of the most powerful ways to stand out and strengthen your medical school or residency application. In these instances, you are mostly referencing other research papers, and it becomes more important to quickly determine relevance and value prior to committing a more in-depth reading and analysis. You will also use papers as tools to figure out other papers to read by taking advantage of their own reference list. Now that you've identified your primary goal, it's time to begin reading. Not every section in a research article is created equal. Unlike reading a traditional book, I don't advise you read a research paper in order. First, you need to read the title and the abstract to get an overview of the paper. If at any time during your reading, you come across a word or acronym that you don't understand, stop and look it up. This is not like a novel where you can infer the meaning and likely not see the word again. The language in research articles is generally pretty straightforward, and terms you don't understand are often the scientific terms that are critical to your understanding of the paper and its findings. Next, dive into the conclusion. Again, this is a research paper, not a novel, so you're not running into any spoilers. The conclusion effectively summarizes the most pertinent findings. Now that you have a better idea of what the paper is about, spend as much time as you desire going over the figures, methods, results, and discussion sections. The discussion will likely be the highest-dealed portion that requires the most amount of time, but to truly understand the paper, you must also go over the methods, results, and figures. A big element to reading papers is understanding the limitations of the study, which then allows you to more accurately determine the paper's significance. The biggest and most widespread mistake is jumping to the conclusion and not understanding the limitations and generalizability of the study. Look at any media article summarizing new, groundbreaking research, and you'll see what I mean. Towards the end of the discussion section in most any paper, you'll find the author's own interpretation of the limitations of their study. But there are always many more limitations beyond what they mention. There have been entire books dedicated to the nuances of statistics and extrapolating conclusions from research, and this is something I may consider making a dedicated future video on. Let me know in the comments below so I can gauge interest. Most people know about randomization, placebo-controlled, and single or double-blinded studies. That being said, there is so much more nuance to it. Here are a few examples. First, study design. Is the study retrospective, meaning looking back historically, or prospective, starting with individuals that are then followed over time? Is it a case control, cohort, or cross-sectional study? Number two, what are the endpoints used? If the study draws conclusions about heart disease, but only uses HDL as a surrogate marker, understand that the surrogate is just that, an imperfect proxy. Number three, biases. There are too many to cover, but selection, recall, sampling, confounding, procedure, lead time, and the Hawthorne effect are all biases that you should familiarize yourself with. And number four, basic statistical analyses. Sensitivity vs. specificity, normal and skewed distributions, positive and negative predictive values, etc. Over time, you'll be reading dozens or even hundreds of research papers, and it becomes a challenge to keep everything straight. Again, depending on the purpose, there are a few options to consider. If you're reading as a class assignment, I recommend you print out the paper, highlight, and annotate in the margins as needed. More recently, I've done this on an iPad with the Apple Pencil, such that printing out was no longer necessary. On the other hand, if you're reading in order to write your own paper, start using a citation manager immediately from the beginning. EndNote is often referenced as the rather expensive gold standard, but Mendeley is a free and quite sufficient alternative. As soon as you begin reading papers, import them into your citation manager. In a separate Word document, begin jotting down the key points of your paper that are relevant to your own project. This notes document will now become the main resource from which you will begin writing your own paper. Trust me, it's much better this way, otherwise you'll spend considerable time and effort hunting for facts from the dozens of PDFs that you've read. Lastly, understand that a big part of reading speed in both regular books as well as research papers is your familiarity with the subject. I started off reading neuroscience papers quite slowly, but as my expertise in the area grew, I was able to breeze through them. I knew the anatomy and terminology like the back of my hand, and coming across terms like CA1 vs CA2 neurons of the hippocampus no longer required additional processing. Similarly, when I first started diving into plastic surgery research, I didn't know all the nuances of hand anatomy or the principles of aesthetic surgery. But as I grew to understand more, reading and understanding the literature became second nature, and once again I was able to breeze through them. It's important to keep this in mind to make sure you don't get discouraged. If you consistently apply yourself to reading research articles and follow these steps that I've outlined, you'll be tackling papers with ease in no time. Like it or not, being proficient in research is an essential skill if you want to go to a top medical school or residency program. In a certain way, there's a science but also an art to bolstering a solid research CV and securing impressive letters of recommendation from your PI. You can check out my own personal list of research articles, abstracts, and presentations on my personal website at kevinjubbal.com. It's currently over 60 and counting. Being proficient in research was a huge part of my own success getting into a top medical school and highly competitive residency. It's a challenging ordeal, and very few people know how to address this for maximal effectiveness. Through experimentation and very uncommon techniques, I was able to pump out over 30 items in less than 12 months and secure stellar letters of recommendation. Visit MedSchoolInsiders.com to learn how our team of top advisors can help you master your own research and present your best self in your application and interview. I created this video because you guys requested it. If you have any other requests for other research related videos, let me know down in the comments below. If you made it this far, then there is a lot more content on my Instagram that you will definitely enjoy. Check out at kevinjubbalmd and at MedSchoolInsiders. Thank you guys so much for watching, and I will see you all in that next one.

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• Published: 31 August 2024

Knowledge mapping and evolution of research on older adults’ technology acceptance: a bibliometric study from 2013 to 2023

• Xianru Shang   ORCID: orcid.org/0009-0000-8906-3216 1 ,
• Zijian Liu 1 ,
• Chen Gong 1 ,
• Zhigang Hu 1 ,
• Yuexuan Wu 1 &
• Chengliang Wang   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-2208-3508 2  

Humanities and Social Sciences Communications volume  11 , Article number:  1115 ( 2024 ) Cite this article

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• Science, technology and society

The rapid expansion of information technology and the intensification of population aging are two prominent features of contemporary societal development. Investigating older adults’ acceptance and use of technology is key to facilitating their integration into an information-driven society. Given this context, the technology acceptance of older adults has emerged as a prioritized research topic, attracting widespread attention in the academic community. However, existing research remains fragmented and lacks a systematic framework. To address this gap, we employed bibliometric methods, utilizing the Web of Science Core Collection to conduct a comprehensive review of literature on older adults’ technology acceptance from 2013 to 2023. Utilizing VOSviewer and CiteSpace for data assessment and visualization, we created knowledge mappings of research on older adults’ technology acceptance. Our study employed multidimensional methods such as co-occurrence analysis, clustering, and burst analysis to: (1) reveal research dynamics, key journals, and domains in this field; (2) identify leading countries, their collaborative networks, and core research institutions and authors; (3) recognize the foundational knowledge system centered on theoretical model deepening, emerging technology applications, and research methods and evaluation, uncovering seminal literature and observing a shift from early theoretical and influential factor analyses to empirical studies focusing on individual factors and emerging technologies; (4) moreover, current research hotspots are primarily in the areas of factors influencing technology adoption, human-robot interaction experiences, mobile health management, and aging-in-place technology, highlighting the evolutionary context and quality distribution of research themes. Finally, we recommend that future research should deeply explore improvements in theoretical models, long-term usage, and user experience evaluation. Overall, this study presents a clear framework of existing research in the field of older adults’ technology acceptance, providing an important reference for future theoretical exploration and innovative applications.

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Introduction.

In contemporary society, the rapid development of information technology has been intricately intertwined with the intensifying trend of population aging. According to the latest United Nations forecast, by 2050, the global population aged 65 and above is expected to reach 1.6 billion, representing about 16% of the total global population (UN 2023 ). Given the significant challenges of global aging, there is increasing evidence that emerging technologies have significant potential to maintain health and independence for older adults in their home and healthcare environments (Barnard et al. 2013 ; Soar 2010 ; Vancea and Solé-Casals 2016 ). This includes, but is not limited to, enhancing residential safety with smart home technologies (Touqeer et al. 2021 ; Wang et al. 2022 ), improving living independence through wearable technologies (Perez et al. 2023 ), and increasing medical accessibility via telehealth services (Kruse et al. 2020 ). Technological innovations are redefining the lifestyles of older adults, encouraging a shift from passive to active participation (González et al. 2012 ; Mostaghel 2016 ). Nevertheless, the effective application and dissemination of technology still depends on user acceptance and usage intentions (Naseri et al. 2023 ; Wang et al. 2023a ; Xia et al. 2024 ; Yu et al. 2023 ). Particularly, older adults face numerous challenges in accepting and using new technologies. These challenges include not only physical and cognitive limitations but also a lack of technological experience, along with the influences of social and economic factors (Valk et al. 2018 ; Wilson et al. 2021 ).

User acceptance of technology is a significant focus within information systems (IS) research (Dai et al. 2024 ), with several models developed to explain and predict user behavior towards technology usage, including the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) (Davis 1989 ), TAM2, TAM3, and the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) (Venkatesh et al. 2003 ). Older adults, as a group with unique needs, exhibit different behavioral patterns during technology acceptance than other user groups, and these uniquenesses include changes in cognitive abilities, as well as motivations, attitudes, and perceptions of the use of new technologies (Chen and Chan 2011 ). The continual expansion of technology introduces considerable challenges for older adults, rendering the understanding of their technology acceptance a research priority. Thus, conducting in-depth research into older adults’ acceptance of technology is critically important for enhancing their integration into the information society and improving their quality of life through technological advancements.

Reviewing relevant literature to identify research gaps helps further solidify the theoretical foundation of the research topic. However, many existing literature reviews primarily focus on the factors influencing older adults’ acceptance or intentions to use technology. For instance, Ma et al. ( 2021 ) conducted a comprehensive analysis of the determinants of older adults’ behavioral intentions to use technology; Liu et al. ( 2022 ) categorized key variables in studies of older adults’ technology acceptance, noting a shift in focus towards social and emotional factors; Yap et al. ( 2022 ) identified seven categories of antecedents affecting older adults’ use of technology from an analysis of 26 articles, including technological, psychological, social, personal, cost, behavioral, and environmental factors; Schroeder et al. ( 2023 ) extracted 119 influencing factors from 59 articles and further categorized these into six themes covering demographics, health status, and emotional awareness. Additionally, some studies focus on the application of specific technologies, such as Ferguson et al. ( 2021 ), who explored barriers and facilitators to older adults using wearable devices for heart monitoring, and He et al. ( 2022 ) and Baer et al. ( 2022 ), who each conducted in-depth investigations into the acceptance of social assistive robots and mobile nutrition and fitness apps, respectively. In summary, current literature reviews on older adults’ technology acceptance exhibit certain limitations. Due to the interdisciplinary nature and complex knowledge structure of this field, traditional literature reviews often rely on qualitative analysis, based on literature analysis and periodic summaries, which lack sufficient objectivity and comprehensiveness. Additionally, systematic research is relatively limited, lacking a macroscopic description of the research trajectory from a holistic perspective. Over the past decade, research on older adults’ technology acceptance has experienced rapid growth, with a significant increase in literature, necessitating the adoption of new methods to review and examine the developmental trends in this field (Chen 2006 ; Van Eck and Waltman 2010 ). Bibliometric analysis, as an effective quantitative research method, analyzes published literature through visualization, offering a viable approach to extracting patterns and insights from a large volume of papers, and has been widely applied in numerous scientific research fields (Achuthan et al. 2023 ; Liu and Duffy 2023 ). Therefore, this study will employ bibliometric methods to systematically analyze research articles related to older adults’ technology acceptance published in the Web of Science Core Collection from 2013 to 2023, aiming to understand the core issues and evolutionary trends in the field, and to provide valuable references for future related research. Specifically, this study aims to explore and answer the following questions:

RQ1: What are the research dynamics in the field of older adults’ technology acceptance over the past decade? What are the main academic journals and fields that publish studies related to older adults’ technology acceptance?

RQ2: How is the productivity in older adults’ technology acceptance research distributed among countries, institutions, and authors?

RQ3: What are the knowledge base and seminal literature in older adults’ technology acceptance research? How has the research theme progressed?

RQ4: What are the current hot topics and their evolutionary trajectories in older adults’ technology acceptance research? How is the quality of research distributed?

Methodology and materials

Research method.

In recent years, bibliometrics has become one of the crucial methods for analyzing literature reviews and is widely used in disciplinary and industrial intelligence analysis (Jing et al. 2023 ; Lin and Yu 2024a ; Wang et al. 2024a ; Xu et al. 2021 ). Bibliometric software facilitates the visualization analysis of extensive literature data, intuitively displaying the network relationships and evolutionary processes between knowledge units, and revealing the underlying knowledge structure and potential information (Chen et al. 2024 ; López-Robles et al. 2018 ; Wang et al. 2024c ). This method provides new insights into the current status and trends of specific research areas, along with quantitative evidence, thereby enhancing the objectivity and scientific validity of the research conclusions (Chen et al. 2023 ; Geng et al. 2024 ). VOSviewer and CiteSpace are two widely used bibliometric software tools in academia (Pan et al. 2018 ), recognized for their robust functionalities based on the JAVA platform. Although each has its unique features, combining these two software tools effectively constructs mapping relationships between literature knowledge units and clearly displays the macrostructure of the knowledge domains. Particularly, VOSviewer, with its excellent graphical representation capabilities, serves as an ideal tool for handling large datasets and precisely identifying the focal points and hotspots of research topics. Therefore, this study utilizes VOSviewer (version 1.6.19) and CiteSpace (version 6.1.R6), combined with in-depth literature analysis, to comprehensively examine and interpret the research theme of older adults’ technology acceptance through an integrated application of quantitative and qualitative methods.

Data source

Web of Science is a comprehensively recognized database in academia, featuring literature that has undergone rigorous peer review and editorial scrutiny (Lin and Yu 2024b ; Mongeon and Paul-Hus 2016 ; Pranckutė 2021 ). This study utilizes the Web of Science Core Collection as its data source, specifically including three major citation indices: Science Citation Index Expanded (SCIE), Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI), and Arts & Humanities Citation Index (A&HCI). These indices encompass high-quality research literature in the fields of science, social sciences, and arts and humanities, ensuring the comprehensiveness and reliability of the data. We combined “older adults” with “technology acceptance” through thematic search, with the specific search strategy being: TS = (elder OR elderly OR aging OR ageing OR senile OR senior OR old people OR “older adult*”) AND TS = (“technology acceptance” OR “user acceptance” OR “consumer acceptance”). The time span of literature search is from 2013 to 2023, with the types limited to “Article” and “Review” and the language to “English”. Additionally, the search was completed by October 27, 2023, to avoid data discrepancies caused by database updates. The initial search yielded 764 journal articles. Given that searches often retrieve articles that are superficially relevant but actually non-compliant, manual screening post-search was essential to ensure the relevance of the literature (Chen et al. 2024 ). Through manual screening, articles significantly deviating from the research theme were eliminated and rigorously reviewed. Ultimately, this study obtained 500 valid sample articles from the Web of Science Core Collection. The complete PRISMA screening process is illustrated in Fig. 1 .

Presentation of the data culling process in detail.

Data standardization

Raw data exported from databases often contain multiple expressions of the same terminology (Nguyen and Hallinger 2020 ). To ensure the accuracy and consistency of data, it is necessary to standardize the raw data (Strotmann and Zhao 2012 ). This study follows the data standardization process proposed by Taskin and Al ( 2019 ), mainly executing the following operations:

(1) Standardization of author and institution names is conducted to address different name expressions for the same author. For instance, “Chan, Alan Hoi Shou” and “Chan, Alan H. S.” are considered the same author, and distinct authors with the same name are differentiated by adding identifiers. Diverse forms of institutional names are unified to address variations caused by name changes or abbreviations, such as standardizing “FRANKFURT UNIV APPL SCI” and “Frankfurt University of Applied Sciences,” as well as “Chinese University of Hong Kong” and “University of Hong Kong” to consistent names.

(2) Different expressions of journal names are unified. For example, “International Journal of Human-Computer Interaction” and “Int J Hum Comput Interact” are standardized to a single name. This ensures consistency in journal names and prevents misclassification of literature due to differing journal names. Additionally, it involves checking if the journals have undergone name changes in the past decade to prevent any impact on the analysis due to such changes.

(3) Keywords data are cleansed by removing words that do not directly pertain to specific research content (e.g., people, review), merging synonyms (e.g., “UX” and “User Experience,” “aging-in-place” and “aging in place”), and standardizing plural forms of keywords (e.g., “assistive technologies” and “assistive technology,” “social robots” and “social robot”). This reduces redundant information in knowledge mapping.

Bibliometric results and analysis

Distribution power (rq1), literature descriptive statistical analysis.

Table 1 presents a detailed descriptive statistical overview of the literature in the field of older adults’ technology acceptance. After deduplication using the CiteSpace software, this study confirmed a valid sample size of 500 articles. Authored by 1839 researchers, the documents encompass 792 research institutions across 54 countries and are published in 217 different academic journals. As of the search cutoff date, these articles have accumulated 13,829 citations, with an annual average of 1156 citations, and an average of 27.66 citations per article. The h-index, a composite metric of quantity and quality of scientific output (Kamrani et al. 2021 ), reached 60 in this study.

Trends in publications and disciplinary distribution

The number of publications and citations are significant indicators of the research field’s development, reflecting its continuity, attention, and impact (Ale Ebrahim et al. 2014 ). The ranking of annual publications and citations in the field of older adults’ technology acceptance studies is presented chronologically in Fig. 2A . The figure shows a clear upward trend in the amount of literature in this field. Between 2013 and 2017, the number of publications increased slowly and decreased in 2018. However, in 2019, the number of publications increased rapidly to 52 and reached a peak of 108 in 2022, which is 6.75 times higher than in 2013. In 2022, the frequency of document citations reached its highest point with 3466 citations, reflecting the widespread recognition and citation of research in this field. Moreover, the curve of the annual number of publications fits a quadratic function, with a goodness-of-fit R 2 of 0.9661, indicating that the number of future publications is expected to increase even more rapidly.

A Trends in trends in annual publications and citations (2013–2023). B Overlay analysis of the distribution of discipline fields.

Figure 2B shows that research on older adults’ technology acceptance involves the integration of multidisciplinary knowledge. According to Web of Science Categories, these 500 articles are distributed across 85 different disciplines. We have tabulated the top ten disciplines by publication volume (Table 2 ), which include Medical Informatics (75 articles, 15.00%), Health Care Sciences & Services (71 articles, 14.20%), Gerontology (61 articles, 12.20%), Public Environmental & Occupational Health (57 articles, 11.40%), and Geriatrics & Gerontology (52 articles, 10.40%), among others. The high output in these disciplines reflects the concentrated global academic interest in this comprehensive research topic. Additionally, interdisciplinary research approaches provide diverse perspectives and a solid theoretical foundation for studies on older adults’ technology acceptance, also paving the way for new research directions.

Knowledge flow analysis

A dual-map overlay is a CiteSpace map superimposed on top of a base map, which shows the interrelationships between journals in different domains, representing the publication and citation activities in each domain (Chen and Leydesdorff 2014 ). The overlay map reveals the link between the citing domain (on the left side) and the cited domain (on the right side), reflecting the knowledge flow of the discipline at the journal level (Leydesdorff and Rafols 2012 ). We utilize the in-built Z-score algorithm of the software to cluster the graph, as shown in Fig. 3 .

The left side shows the citing journal, and the right side shows the cited journal.

Figure 3 shows the distribution of citing journals clusters for older adults’ technology acceptance on the left side, while the right side refers to the main cited journals clusters. Two knowledge flow citation trajectories were obtained; they are presented by the color of the cited regions, and the thickness of these trajectories is proportional to the Z-score scaled frequency of citations (Chen et al. 2014 ). Within the cited regions, the most popular fields with the most records covered are “HEALTH, NURSING, MEDICINE” and “PSYCHOLOGY, EDUCATION, SOCIAL”, and the elliptical aspect ratio of these two fields stands out. Fields have prominent elliptical aspect ratios, highlighting their significant influence on older adults’ technology acceptance research. Additionally, the major citation trajectories originate in these two areas and progress to the frontier research area of “PSYCHOLOGY, EDUCATION, HEALTH”. It is worth noting that the citation trajectory from “PSYCHOLOGY, EDUCATION, SOCIAL” has a significant Z-value (z = 6.81), emphasizing the significance and impact of this development path. In the future, “MATHEMATICS, SYSTEMS, MATHEMATICAL”, “MOLECULAR, BIOLOGY, IMMUNOLOGY”, and “NEUROLOGY, SPORTS, OPHTHALMOLOGY” may become emerging fields. The fields of “MEDICINE, MEDICAL, CLINICAL” may be emerging areas of cutting-edge research.

Main research journals analysis

Table 3 provides statistics for the top ten journals by publication volume in the field of older adults’ technology acceptance. Together, these journals have published 137 articles, accounting for 27.40% of the total publications, indicating that there is no highly concentrated core group of journals in this field, with publications being relatively dispersed. Notably, Computers in Human Behavior , Journal of Medical Internet Research , and International Journal of Human-Computer Interaction each lead with 15 publications. In terms of citation metrics, International Journal of Medical Informatics and Computers in Human Behavior stand out significantly, with the former accumulating a total of 1,904 citations, averaging 211.56 citations per article, and the latter totaling 1,449 citations, with an average of 96.60 citations per article. These figures emphasize the academic authority and widespread impact of these journals within the research field.

Research power (RQ2)

Countries and collaborations analysis.

The analysis revealed the global research pattern for country distribution and collaboration (Chen et al. 2019 ). Figure 4A shows the network of national collaborations on older adults’ technology acceptance research. The size of the bubbles represents the amount of publications in each country, while the thickness of the connecting lines expresses the closeness of the collaboration among countries. Generally, this research subject has received extensive international attention, with China and the USA publishing far more than any other countries. China has established notable research collaborations with the USA, UK and Malaysia in this field, while other countries have collaborations, but the closeness is relatively low and scattered. Figure 4B shows the annual publication volume dynamics of the top ten countries in terms of total publications. Since 2017, China has consistently increased its annual publications, while the USA has remained relatively stable. In 2019, the volume of publications in each country increased significantly, this was largely due to the global outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has led to increased reliance on information technology among the elderly for medical consultations, online socialization, and health management (Sinha et al. 2021 ). This phenomenon has led to research advances in technology acceptance among older adults in various countries. Table 4 shows that the top ten countries account for 93.20% of the total cumulative number of publications, with each country having published more than 20 papers. Among these ten countries, all of them except China are developed countries, indicating that the research field of older adults’ technology acceptance has received general attention from developed countries. Currently, China and the USA were the leading countries in terms of publications with 111 and 104 respectively, accounting for 22.20% and 20.80%. The UK, Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands also made significant contributions. The USA and China ranked first and second in terms of the number of citations, while the Netherlands had the highest average citations, indicating the high impact and quality of its research. The UK has shown outstanding performance in international cooperation, while the USA highlights its significant academic influence in this field with the highest h-index value.

A National collaboration network. B Annual volume of publications in the top 10 countries.

Institutions and authors analysis

Analyzing the number of publications and citations can reveal an institution’s or author’s research strength and influence in a particular research area (Kwiek 2021 ). Tables 5 and 6 show the statistics of the institutions and authors whose publication counts are in the top ten, respectively. As shown in Table 5 , higher education institutions hold the main position in this research field. Among the top ten institutions, City University of Hong Kong and The University of Hong Kong from China lead with 14 and 9 publications, respectively. City University of Hong Kong has the highest h-index, highlighting its significant influence in the field. It is worth noting that Tilburg University in the Netherlands is not among the top five in terms of publications, but the high average citation count (130.14) of its literature demonstrates the high quality of its research.

After analyzing the authors’ output using Price’s Law (Redner 1998 ), the highest number of publications among the authors counted ( n  = 10) defines a publication threshold of 3 for core authors in this research area. As a result of quantitative screening, a total of 63 core authors were identified. Table 6 shows that Chen from Zhejiang University, China, Ziefle from RWTH Aachen University, Germany, and Rogers from Macquarie University, Australia, were the top three authors in terms of the number of publications, with 10, 9, and 8 articles, respectively. In terms of average citation rate, Peek and Wouters, both scholars from the Netherlands, have significantly higher rates than other scholars, with 183.2 and 152.67 respectively. This suggests that their research is of high quality and widely recognized. Additionally, Chen and Rogers have high h-indices in this field.

Knowledge base and theme progress (RQ3)

Research knowledge base.

Co-citation relationships occur when two documents are cited together (Zhang and Zhu 2022 ). Co-citation mapping uses references as nodes to represent the knowledge base of a subject area (Min et al. 2021). Figure 5A illustrates co-occurrence mapping in older adults’ technology acceptance research, where larger nodes signify higher co-citation frequencies. Co-citation cluster analysis can be used to explore knowledge structure and research boundaries (Hota et al. 2020 ; Shiau et al. 2023 ). The co-citation clustering mapping of older adults’ technology acceptance research literature (Fig. 5B ) shows that the Q value of the clustering result is 0.8129 (>0.3), and the average value of the weight S is 0.9391 (>0.7), indicating that the clusters are uniformly distributed with a significant and credible structure. This further proves that the boundaries of the research field are clear and there is significant differentiation in the field. The figure features 18 cluster labels, each associated with thematic color blocks corresponding to different time slices. Highlighted emerging research themes include #2 Smart Home Technology, #7 Social Live, and #10 Customer Service. Furthermore, the clustering labels extracted are primarily classified into three categories: theoretical model deepening, emerging technology applications, research methods and evaluation, as detailed in Table 7 .

A Co-citation analysis of references. B Clustering network analysis of references.

Seminal literature analysis

The top ten nodes in terms of co-citation frequency were selected for further analysis. Table 8 displays the corresponding node information. Studies were categorized into four main groups based on content analysis. (1) Research focusing on specific technology usage by older adults includes studies by Peek et al. ( 2014 ), Ma et al. ( 2016 ), Hoque and Sorwar ( 2017 ), and Li et al. ( 2019 ), who investigated the factors influencing the use of e-technology, smartphones, mHealth, and smart wearables, respectively. (2) Concerning the development of theoretical models of technology acceptance, Chen and Chan ( 2014 ) introduced the Senior Technology Acceptance Model (STAM), and Macedo ( 2017 ) analyzed the predictive power of UTAUT2 in explaining older adults’ intentional behaviors and information technology usage. (3) In exploring older adults’ information technology adoption and behavior, Lee and Coughlin ( 2015 ) emphasized that the adoption of technology by older adults is a multifactorial process that includes performance, price, value, usability, affordability, accessibility, technical support, social support, emotion, independence, experience, and confidence. Yusif et al. ( 2016 ) conducted a literature review examining the key barriers affecting older adults’ adoption of assistive technology, including factors such as privacy, trust, functionality/added value, cost, and stigma. (4) From the perspective of research into older adults’ technology acceptance, Mitzner et al. ( 2019 ) assessed the long-term usage of computer systems designed for the elderly, whereas Guner and Acarturk ( 2020 ) compared information technology usage and acceptance between older and younger adults. The breadth and prevalence of this literature make it a vital reference for researchers in the field, also providing new perspectives and inspiration for future research directions.

Research thematic progress

Burst citation is a node of literature that guides the sudden change in dosage, which usually represents a prominent development or major change in a particular field, with innovative and forward-looking qualities. By analyzing the emergent literature, it is often easy to understand the dynamics of the subject area, mapping the emerging thematic change (Chen et al. 2022 ). Figure 6 shows the burst citation mapping in the field of older adults’ technology acceptance research, with burst citations represented by red nodes (Fig. 6A ). For the ten papers with the highest burst intensity (Fig. 6B ), this study will conduct further analysis in conjunction with literature review.

A Burst detection of co-citation. B The top 10 references with the strongest citation bursts.

As shown in Fig. 6 , Mitzner et al. ( 2010 ) broke the stereotype that older adults are fearful of technology, found that they actually have positive attitudes toward technology, and emphasized the centrality of ease of use and usefulness in the process of technology acceptance. This finding provides an important foundation for subsequent research. During the same period, Wagner et al. ( 2010 ) conducted theory-deepening and applied research on technology acceptance among older adults. The research focused on older adults’ interactions with computers from the perspective of Social Cognitive Theory (SCT). This expanded the understanding of technology acceptance, particularly regarding the relationship between behavior, environment, and other SCT elements. In addition, Pan and Jordan-Marsh ( 2010 ) extended the TAM to examine the interactions among predictors of perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, subjective norm, and convenience conditions when older adults use the Internet, taking into account the moderating roles of gender and age. Heerink et al. ( 2010 ) adapted and extended the UTAUT, constructed a technology acceptance model specifically designed for older users’ acceptance of assistive social agents, and validated it using controlled experiments and longitudinal data, explaining intention to use by combining functional assessment and social interaction variables.

Then the research theme shifted to an in-depth analysis of the factors influencing technology acceptance among older adults. Two papers with high burst strengths emerged during this period: Peek et al. ( 2014 ) (Strength = 12.04), Chen and Chan ( 2014 ) (Strength = 9.81). Through a systematic literature review and empirical study, Peek STM and Chen K, among others, identified multidimensional factors that influence older adults’ technology acceptance. Peek et al. ( 2014 ) analyzed literature on the acceptance of in-home care technology among older adults and identified six factors that influence their acceptance: concerns about technology, expected benefits, technology needs, technology alternatives, social influences, and older adult characteristics, with a focus on differences between pre- and post-implementation factors. Chen and Chan ( 2014 ) constructed the STAM by administering a questionnaire to 1012 older adults and adding eight important factors, including technology anxiety, self-efficacy, cognitive ability, and physical function, based on the TAM. This enriches the theoretical foundation of the field. In addition, Braun ( 2013 ) highlighted the role of perceived usefulness, trust in social networks, and frequency of Internet use in older adults’ use of social networks, while ease of use and social pressure were not significant influences. These findings contribute to the study of older adults’ technology acceptance within specific technology application domains.

Recent research has focused on empirical studies of personal factors and emerging technologies. Ma et al. ( 2016 ) identified key personal factors affecting smartphone acceptance among older adults through structured questionnaires and face-to-face interviews with 120 participants. The study found that cost, self-satisfaction, and convenience were important factors influencing perceived usefulness and ease of use. This study offers empirical evidence to comprehend the main factors that drive smartphone acceptance among Chinese older adults. Additionally, Yusif et al. ( 2016 ) presented an overview of the obstacles that hinder older adults’ acceptance of assistive technologies, focusing on privacy, trust, and functionality.

In summary, research on older adults’ technology acceptance has shifted from early theoretical deepening and analysis of influencing factors to empirical studies in the areas of personal factors and emerging technologies, which have greatly enriched the theoretical basis of older adults’ technology acceptance and provided practical guidance for the design of emerging technology products.

Research hotspots, evolutionary trends, and quality distribution (RQ4)

Core keywords analysis.

Keywords concise the main idea and core of the literature, and are a refined summary of the research content (Huang et al. 2021 ). In CiteSpace, nodes with a centrality value greater than 0.1 are considered to be critical nodes. Analyzing keywords with high frequency and centrality helps to visualize the hot topics in the research field (Park et al. 2018 ). The merged keywords were imported into CiteSpace, and the top 10 keywords were counted and sorted by frequency and centrality respectively, as shown in Table 9 . The results show that the keyword “TAM” has the highest frequency (92), followed by “UTAUT” (24), which reflects that the in-depth study of the existing technology acceptance model and its theoretical expansion occupy a central position in research related to older adults’ technology acceptance. Furthermore, the terms ‘assistive technology’ and ‘virtual reality’ are both high-frequency and high-centrality terms (frequency = 17, centrality = 0.10), indicating that the research on assistive technology and virtual reality for older adults is the focus of current academic attention.

Research hotspots analysis

Using VOSviewer for keyword co-occurrence analysis organizes keywords into groups or clusters based on their intrinsic connections and frequencies, clearly highlighting the research field’s hot topics. The connectivity among keywords reveals correlations between different topics. To ensure accuracy, the analysis only considered the authors’ keywords. Subsequently, the keywords were filtered by setting the keyword frequency to 5 to obtain the keyword clustering map of the research on older adults’ technology acceptance research keyword clustering mapping (Fig. 7 ), combined with the keyword co-occurrence clustering network (Fig. 7A ) and the corresponding density situation (Fig. 7B ) to make a detailed analysis of the following four groups of clustered themes.

A Co-occurrence clustering network. B Keyword density.

Cluster #1—Research on the factors influencing technology adoption among older adults is a prominent topic, covering age, gender, self-efficacy, attitude, and and intention to use (Berkowsky et al. 2017 ; Wang et al. 2017 ). It also examined older adults’ attitudes towards and acceptance of digital health technologies (Ahmad and Mozelius, 2022 ). Moreover, the COVID-19 pandemic, significantly impacting older adults’ technology attitudes and usage, has underscored the study’s importance and urgency. Therefore, it is crucial to conduct in-depth studies on how older adults accept, adopt, and effectively use new technologies, to address their needs and help them overcome the digital divide within digital inclusion. This will improve their quality of life and healthcare experiences.

Cluster #2—Research focuses on how older adults interact with assistive technologies, especially assistive robots and health monitoring devices, emphasizing trust, usability, and user experience as crucial factors (Halim et al. 2022 ). Moreover, health monitoring technologies effectively track and manage health issues common in older adults, like dementia and mild cognitive impairment (Lussier et al. 2018 ; Piau et al. 2019 ). Interactive exercise games and virtual reality have been deployed to encourage more physical and cognitive engagement among older adults (Campo-Prieto et al. 2021 ). Personalized and innovative technology significantly enhances older adults’ participation, improving their health and well-being.

Cluster #3—Optimizing health management for older adults using mobile technology. With the development of mobile health (mHealth) and health information technology, mobile applications, smartphones, and smart wearable devices have become effective tools to help older users better manage chronic conditions, conduct real-time health monitoring, and even receive telehealth services (Dupuis and Tsotsos 2018 ; Olmedo-Aguirre et al. 2022 ; Kim et al. 2014 ). Additionally, these technologies can mitigate the problem of healthcare resource inequality, especially in developing countries. Older adults’ acceptance and use of these technologies are significantly influenced by their behavioral intentions, motivational factors, and self-management skills. These internal motivational factors, along with external factors, jointly affect older adults’ performance in health management and quality of life.

Cluster #4—Research on technology-assisted home care for older adults is gaining popularity. Environmentally assisted living enhances older adults’ independence and comfort at home, offering essential support and security. This has a crucial impact on promoting healthy aging (Friesen et al. 2016 ; Wahlroos et al. 2023 ). The smart home is a core application in this field, providing a range of solutions that facilitate independent living for the elderly in a highly integrated and user-friendly manner. This fulfills different dimensions of living and health needs (Majumder et al. 2017 ). Moreover, eHealth offers accurate and personalized health management and healthcare services for older adults (Delmastro et al. 2018 ), ensuring their needs are met at home. Research in this field often employs qualitative methods and structural equation modeling to fully understand older adults’ needs and experiences at home and analyze factors influencing technology adoption.

Evolutionary trends analysis

To gain a deeper understanding of the evolutionary trends in research hotspots within the field of older adults’ technology acceptance, we conducted a statistical analysis of the average appearance times of keywords, using CiteSpace to generate the time-zone evolution mapping (Fig. 8 ) and burst keywords. The time-zone mapping visually displays the evolution of keywords over time, intuitively reflecting the frequency and initial appearance of keywords in research, commonly used to identify trends in research topics (Jing et al. 2024a ; Kumar et al. 2021 ). Table 10 lists the top 15 keywords by burst strength, with the red sections indicating high-frequency citations and their burst strength in specific years. These burst keywords reveal the focus and trends of research themes over different periods (Kleinberg 2002 ). Combining insights from the time-zone mapping and burst keywords provides more objective and accurate research insights (Wang et al. 2023b ).

Reflecting the frequency and time of first appearance of keywords in the study.

An integrated analysis of Fig. 8 and Table 10 shows that early research on older adults’ technology acceptance primarily focused on factors such as perceived usefulness, ease of use, and attitudes towards information technology, including their use of computers and the internet (Pan and Jordan-Marsh 2010 ), as well as differences in technology use between older adults and other age groups (Guner and Acarturk 2020 ). Subsequently, the research focus expanded to improving the quality of life for older adults, exploring how technology can optimize health management and enhance the possibility of independent living, emphasizing the significant role of technology in improving the quality of life for the elderly. With ongoing technological advancements, recent research has shifted towards areas such as “virtual reality,” “telehealth,” and “human-robot interaction,” with a focus on the user experience of older adults (Halim et al. 2022 ). The appearance of keywords such as “physical activity” and “exercise” highlights the value of technology in promoting physical activity and health among older adults. This phase of research tends to make cutting-edge technology genuinely serve the practical needs of older adults, achieving its widespread application in daily life. Additionally, research has focused on expanding and quantifying theoretical models of older adults’ technology acceptance, involving keywords such as “perceived risk”, “validation” and “UTAUT”.

In summary, from 2013 to 2023, the field of older adults’ technology acceptance has evolved from initial explorations of influencing factors, to comprehensive enhancements in quality of life and health management, and further to the application and deepening of theoretical models and cutting-edge technologies. This research not only reflects the diversity and complexity of the field but also demonstrates a comprehensive and in-depth understanding of older adults’ interactions with technology across various life scenarios and needs.

Research quality distribution

To reveal the distribution of research quality in the field of older adults’ technology acceptance, a strategic diagram analysis is employed to calculate and illustrate the internal development and interrelationships among various research themes (Xie et al. 2020 ). The strategic diagram uses Centrality as the X-axis and Density as the Y-axis to divide into four quadrants, where the X-axis represents the strength of the connection between thematic clusters and other themes, with higher values indicating a central position in the research field; the Y-axis indicates the level of development within the thematic clusters, with higher values denoting a more mature and widely recognized field (Li and Zhou 2020 ).

Through cluster analysis and manual verification, this study categorized 61 core keywords (Frequency ≥5) into 11 thematic clusters. Subsequently, based on the keywords covered by each thematic cluster, the research themes and their directions for each cluster were summarized (Table 11 ), and the centrality and density coordinates for each cluster were precisely calculated (Table 12 ). Finally, a strategic diagram of the older adults’ technology acceptance research field was constructed (Fig. 9 ). Based on the distribution of thematic clusters across the quadrants in the strategic diagram, the structure and developmental trends of the field were interpreted.

Classification and visualization of theme clusters based on density and centrality.

As illustrated in Fig. 9 , (1) the theme clusters of #3 Usage Experience and #4 Assisted Living Technology are in the first quadrant, characterized by high centrality and density. Their internal cohesion and close links with other themes indicate their mature development, systematic research content or directions have been formed, and they have a significant influence on other themes. These themes play a central role in the field of older adults’ technology acceptance and have promising prospects. (2) The theme clusters of #6 Smart Devices, #9 Theoretical Models, and #10 Mobile Health Applications are in the second quadrant, with higher density but lower centrality. These themes have strong internal connections but weaker external links, indicating that these three themes have received widespread attention from researchers and have been the subject of related research, but more as self-contained systems and exhibit independence. Therefore, future research should further explore in-depth cooperation and cross-application with other themes. (3) The theme clusters of #7 Human-Robot Interaction, #8 Characteristics of the Elderly, and #11 Research Methods are in the third quadrant, with lower centrality and density. These themes are loosely connected internally and have weak links with others, indicating their developmental immaturity. Compared to other topics, they belong to the lower attention edge and niche themes, and there is a need for further investigation. (4) The theme clusters of #1 Digital Healthcare Technology, #2 Psychological Factors, and #5 Socio-Cultural Factors are located in the fourth quadrant, with high centrality but low density. Although closely associated with other research themes, the internal cohesion within these clusters is relatively weak. This suggests that while these themes are closely linked to other research areas, their own development remains underdeveloped, indicating a core immaturity. Nevertheless, these themes are crucial within the research domain of elderly technology acceptance and possess significant potential for future exploration.

Discussion on distribution power (RQ1)

Over the past decade, academic interest and influence in the area of older adults’ technology acceptance have significantly increased. This trend is evidenced by a quantitative analysis of publication and citation volumes, particularly noticeable in 2019 and 2022, where there was a substantial rise in both metrics. The rise is closely linked to the widespread adoption of emerging technologies such as smart homes, wearable devices, and telemedicine among older adults. While these technologies have enhanced their quality of life, they also pose numerous challenges, sparking extensive research into their acceptance, usage behaviors, and influencing factors among the older adults (Pirzada et al. 2022 ; Garcia Reyes et al. 2023 ). Furthermore, the COVID-19 pandemic led to a surge in technology demand among older adults, especially in areas like medical consultation, online socialization, and health management, further highlighting the importance and challenges of technology. Health risks and social isolation have compelled older adults to rely on technology for daily activities, accelerating its adoption and application within this demographic. This phenomenon has made technology acceptance a critical issue, driving societal and academic focus on the study of technology acceptance among older adults.

The flow of knowledge at the level of high-output disciplines and journals, along with the primary publishing outlets, indicates the highly interdisciplinary nature of research into older adults’ technology acceptance. This reflects the complexity and breadth of issues related to older adults’ technology acceptance, necessitating the integration of multidisciplinary knowledge and approaches. Currently, research is primarily focused on medical health and human-computer interaction, demonstrating academic interest in improving health and quality of life for older adults and addressing the urgent needs related to their interactions with technology. In the field of medical health, research aims to provide advanced and innovative healthcare technologies and services to meet the challenges of an aging population while improving the quality of life for older adults (Abdi et al. 2020 ; Wilson et al. 2021 ). In the field of human-computer interaction, research is focused on developing smarter and more user-friendly interaction models to meet the needs of older adults in the digital age, enabling them to actively participate in social activities and enjoy a higher quality of life (Sayago, 2019 ). These studies are crucial for addressing the challenges faced by aging societies, providing increased support and opportunities for the health, welfare, and social participation of older adults.

Discussion on research power (RQ2)

This study analyzes leading countries and collaboration networks, core institutions and authors, revealing the global research landscape and distribution of research strength in the field of older adults’ technology acceptance, and presents quantitative data on global research trends. From the analysis of country distribution and collaborations, China and the USA hold dominant positions in this field, with developed countries like the UK, Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands also excelling in international cooperation and research influence. The significant investment in technological research and the focus on the technological needs of older adults by many developed countries reflect their rapidly aging societies, policy support, and resource allocation.

China is the only developing country that has become a major contributor in this field, indicating its growing research capabilities and high priority given to aging societies and technological innovation. Additionally, China has close collaborations with countries such as USA, the UK, and Malaysia, driven not only by technological research needs but also by shared challenges and complementarities in aging issues among these nations. For instance, the UK has extensive experience in social welfare and aging research, providing valuable theoretical guidance and practical experience. International collaborations, aimed at addressing the challenges of aging, integrate the strengths of various countries, advancing in-depth and widespread development in the research of technology acceptance among older adults.

At the institutional and author level, City University of Hong Kong leads in publication volume, with research teams led by Chan and Chen demonstrating significant academic activity and contributions. Their research primarily focuses on older adults’ acceptance and usage behaviors of various technologies, including smartphones, smart wearables, and social robots (Chen et al. 2015 ; Li et al. 2019 ; Ma et al. 2016 ). These studies, targeting specific needs and product characteristics of older adults, have developed new models of technology acceptance based on existing frameworks, enhancing the integration of these technologies into their daily lives and laying a foundation for further advancements in the field. Although Tilburg University has a smaller publication output, it holds significant influence in the field of older adults’ technology acceptance. Particularly, the high citation rate of Peek’s studies highlights their excellence in research. Peek extensively explored older adults’ acceptance and usage of home care technologies, revealing the complexity and dynamics of their technology use behaviors. His research spans from identifying systemic influencing factors (Peek et al. 2014 ; Peek et al. 2016 ), emphasizing familial impacts (Luijkx et al. 2015 ), to constructing comprehensive models (Peek et al. 2017 ), and examining the dynamics of long-term usage (Peek et al. 2019 ), fully reflecting the evolving technology landscape and the changing needs of older adults. Additionally, the ongoing contributions of researchers like Ziefle, Rogers, and Wouters in the field of older adults’ technology acceptance demonstrate their research influence and leadership. These researchers have significantly enriched the knowledge base in this area with their diverse perspectives. For instance, Ziefle has uncovered the complex attitudes of older adults towards technology usage, especially the trade-offs between privacy and security, and how different types of activities affect their privacy needs (Maidhof et al. 2023 ; Mujirishvili et al. 2023 ; Schomakers and Ziefle 2023 ; Wilkowska et al. 2022 ), reflecting a deep exploration and ongoing innovation in the field of older adults’ technology acceptance.

Discussion on knowledge base and thematic progress (RQ3)

Through co-citation analysis and systematic review of seminal literature, this study reveals the knowledge foundation and thematic progress in the field of older adults’ technology acceptance. Co-citation networks and cluster analyses illustrate the structural themes of the research, delineating the differentiation and boundaries within this field. Additionally, burst detection analysis offers a valuable perspective for understanding the thematic evolution in the field of technology acceptance among older adults. The development and innovation of theoretical models are foundational to this research. Researchers enhance the explanatory power of constructed models by deepening and expanding existing technology acceptance theories to address theoretical limitations. For instance, Heerink et al. ( 2010 ) modified and expanded the UTAUT model by integrating functional assessment and social interaction variables to create the almere model. This model significantly enhances the ability to explain the intentions of older users in utilizing assistive social agents and improves the explanation of actual usage behaviors. Additionally, Chen and Chan ( 2014 ) extended the TAM to include age-related health and capability features of older adults, creating the STAM, which substantially improves predictions of older adults’ technology usage behaviors. Personal attributes, health and capability features, and facilitating conditions have a direct impact on technology acceptance. These factors more effectively predict older adults’ technology usage behaviors than traditional attitudinal factors.

With the advancement of technology and the application of emerging technologies, new research topics have emerged, increasingly focusing on older adults’ acceptance and use of these technologies. Prior to this, the study by Mitzner et al. ( 2010 ) challenged the stereotype of older adults’ conservative attitudes towards technology, highlighting the central roles of usability and usefulness in the technology acceptance process. This discovery laid an important foundation for subsequent research. Research fields such as “smart home technology,” “social life,” and “customer service” are emerging, indicating a shift in focus towards the practical and social applications of technology in older adults’ lives. Research not only focuses on the technology itself but also on how these technologies integrate into older adults’ daily lives and how they can improve the quality of life through technology. For instance, studies such as those by Ma et al. ( 2016 ), Hoque and Sorwar ( 2017 ), and Li et al. ( 2019 ) have explored factors influencing older adults’ use of smartphones, mHealth, and smart wearable devices.

Furthermore, the diversification of research methodologies and innovation in evaluation techniques, such as the use of mixed methods, structural equation modeling (SEM), and neural network (NN) approaches, have enhanced the rigor and reliability of the findings, enabling more precise identification of the factors and mechanisms influencing technology acceptance. Talukder et al. ( 2020 ) employed an effective multimethodological strategy by integrating SEM and NN to leverage the complementary strengths of both approaches, thus overcoming their individual limitations and more accurately analyzing and predicting older adults’ acceptance of wearable health technologies (WHT). SEM is utilized to assess the determinants’ impact on the adoption of WHT, while neural network models validate SEM outcomes and predict the significance of key determinants. This combined approach not only boosts the models’ reliability and explanatory power but also provides a nuanced understanding of the motivations and barriers behind older adults’ acceptance of WHT, offering deep research insights.

Overall, co-citation analysis of the literature in the field of older adults’ technology acceptance has uncovered deeper theoretical modeling and empirical studies on emerging technologies, while emphasizing the importance of research methodological and evaluation innovations in understanding complex social science issues. These findings are crucial for guiding the design and marketing strategies of future technology products, especially in the rapidly growing market of older adults.

Discussion on research hotspots and evolutionary trends (RQ4)

By analyzing core keywords, we can gain deep insights into the hot topics, evolutionary trends, and quality distribution of research in the field of older adults’ technology acceptance. The frequent occurrence of the keywords “TAM” and “UTAUT” indicates that the applicability and theoretical extension of existing technology acceptance models among older adults remain a focal point in academia. This phenomenon underscores the enduring influence of the studies by Davis ( 1989 ) and Venkatesh et al. ( 2003 ), whose models provide a robust theoretical framework for explaining and predicting older adults’ acceptance and usage of emerging technologies. With the widespread application of artificial intelligence (AI) and big data technologies, these theoretical models have incorporated new variables such as perceived risk, trust, and privacy issues (Amin et al. 2024 ; Chen et al. 2024 ; Jing et al. 2024b ; Seibert et al. 2021 ; Wang et al. 2024b ), advancing the theoretical depth and empirical research in this field.

Keyword co-occurrence cluster analysis has revealed multiple research hotspots in the field, including factors influencing technology adoption, interactive experiences between older adults and assistive technologies, the application of mobile health technology in health management, and technology-assisted home care. These studies primarily focus on enhancing the quality of life and health management of older adults through emerging technologies, particularly in the areas of ambient assisted living, smart health monitoring, and intelligent medical care. In these domains, the role of AI technology is increasingly significant (Qian et al. 2021 ; Ho 2020 ). With the evolution of next-generation information technologies, AI is increasingly integrated into elder care systems, offering intelligent, efficient, and personalized service solutions by analyzing the lifestyles and health conditions of older adults. This integration aims to enhance older adults’ quality of life in aspects such as health monitoring and alerts, rehabilitation assistance, daily health management, and emotional support (Lee et al. 2023 ). A survey indicates that 83% of older adults prefer AI-driven solutions when selecting smart products, demonstrating the increasing acceptance of AI in elder care (Zhao and Li 2024 ). Integrating AI into elder care presents both opportunities and challenges, particularly in terms of user acceptance, trust, and long-term usage effects, which warrant further exploration (Mhlanga 2023 ). These studies will help better understand the profound impact of AI technology on the lifestyles of older adults and provide critical references for optimizing AI-driven elder care services.

The Time-zone evolution mapping and burst keyword analysis further reveal the evolutionary trends of research hotspots. Early studies focused on basic technology acceptance models and user perceptions, later expanding to include quality of life and health management. In recent years, research has increasingly focused on cutting-edge technologies such as virtual reality, telehealth, and human-robot interaction, with a concurrent emphasis on the user experience of older adults. This evolutionary process demonstrates a deepening shift from theoretical models to practical applications, underscoring the significant role of technology in enhancing the quality of life for older adults. Furthermore, the strategic coordinate mapping analysis clearly demonstrates the development and mutual influence of different research themes. High centrality and density in the themes of Usage Experience and Assisted Living Technology indicate their mature research status and significant impact on other themes. The themes of Smart Devices, Theoretical Models, and Mobile Health Applications demonstrate self-contained research trends. The themes of Human-Robot Interaction, Characteristics of the Elderly, and Research Methods are not yet mature, but they hold potential for development. Themes of Digital Healthcare Technology, Psychological Factors, and Socio-Cultural Factors are closely related to other themes, displaying core immaturity but significant potential.

In summary, the research hotspots in the field of older adults’ technology acceptance are diverse and dynamic, demonstrating the academic community’s profound understanding of how older adults interact with technology across various life contexts and needs. Under the influence of AI and big data, research should continue to focus on the application of emerging technologies among older adults, exploring in depth how they adapt to and effectively use these technologies. This not only enhances the quality of life and healthcare experiences for older adults but also drives ongoing innovation and development in this field.

Research agenda

Based on the above research findings, to further understand and promote technology acceptance and usage among older adults, we recommend future studies focus on refining theoretical models, exploring long-term usage, and assessing user experience in the following detailed aspects:

Refinement and validation of specific technology acceptance models for older adults: Future research should focus on developing and validating technology acceptance models based on individual characteristics, particularly considering variations in technology acceptance among older adults across different educational levels and cultural backgrounds. This includes factors such as age, gender, educational background, and cultural differences. Additionally, research should examine how well specific technologies, such as wearable devices and mobile health applications, meet the needs of older adults. Building on existing theoretical models, this research should integrate insights from multiple disciplines such as psychology, sociology, design, and engineering through interdisciplinary collaboration to create more accurate and comprehensive models, which should then be validated in relevant contexts.

Deepening the exploration of the relationship between long-term technology use and quality of life among older adults: The acceptance and use of technology by users is a complex and dynamic process (Seuwou et al. 2016 ). Existing research predominantly focuses on older adults’ initial acceptance or short-term use of new technologies; however, the impact of long-term use on their quality of life and health is more significant. Future research should focus on the evolution of older adults’ experiences and needs during long-term technology usage, and the enduring effects of technology on their social interactions, mental health, and life satisfaction. Through longitudinal studies and qualitative analysis, this research reveals the specific needs and challenges of older adults in long-term technology use, providing a basis for developing technologies and strategies that better meet their requirements. This understanding aids in comprehensively assessing the impact of technology on older adults’ quality of life and guiding the optimization and improvement of technological products.

Evaluating the Importance of User Experience in Research on Older Adults’ Technology Acceptance: Understanding the mechanisms of information technology acceptance and use is central to human-computer interaction research. Although technology acceptance models and user experience models differ in objectives, they share many potential intersections. Technology acceptance research focuses on structured prediction and assessment, while user experience research concentrates on interpreting design impacts and new frameworks. Integrating user experience to assess older adults’ acceptance of technology products and systems is crucial (Codfrey et al. 2022 ; Wang et al. 2019 ), particularly for older users, where specific product designs should emphasize practicality and usability (Fisk et al. 2020 ). Researchers need to explore innovative age-appropriate design methods to enhance older adults’ usage experience. This includes studying older users’ actual usage preferences and behaviors, optimizing user interfaces, and interaction designs. Integrating feedback from older adults to tailor products to their needs can further promote their acceptance and continued use of technology products.

Conclusions

This study conducted a systematic review of the literature on older adults’ technology acceptance over the past decade through bibliometric analysis, focusing on the distribution power, research power, knowledge base and theme progress, research hotspots, evolutionary trends, and quality distribution. Using a combination of quantitative and qualitative methods, this study has reached the following conclusions:

Technology acceptance among older adults has become a hot topic in the international academic community, involving the integration of knowledge across multiple disciplines, including Medical Informatics, Health Care Sciences Services, and Ergonomics. In terms of journals, “PSYCHOLOGY, EDUCATION, HEALTH” represents a leading field, with key publications including Computers in Human Behavior , Journal of Medical Internet Research , and International Journal of Human-Computer Interaction . These journals possess significant academic authority and extensive influence in the field.

Research on technology acceptance among older adults is particularly active in developed countries, with China and USA publishing significantly more than other nations. The Netherlands leads in high average citation rates, indicating the depth and impact of its research. Meanwhile, the UK stands out in terms of international collaboration. At the institutional level, City University of Hong Kong and The University of Hong Kong in China are in leading positions. Tilburg University in the Netherlands demonstrates exceptional research quality through its high average citation count. At the author level, Chen from China has the highest number of publications, while Peek from the Netherlands has the highest average citation count.

Co-citation analysis of references indicates that the knowledge base in this field is divided into three main categories: theoretical model deepening, emerging technology applications, and research methods and evaluation. Seminal literature focuses on four areas: specific technology use by older adults, expansion of theoretical models of technology acceptance, information technology adoption behavior, and research perspectives. Research themes have evolved from initial theoretical deepening and analysis of influencing factors to empirical studies on individual factors and emerging technologies.

Keyword analysis indicates that TAM and UTAUT are the most frequently occurring terms, while “assistive technology” and “virtual reality” are focal points with high frequency and centrality. Keyword clustering analysis reveals that research hotspots are concentrated on the influencing factors of technology adoption, human-robot interaction experiences, mobile health management, and technology for aging in place. Time-zone evolution mapping and burst keyword analysis have revealed the research evolution from preliminary exploration of influencing factors, to enhancements in quality of life and health management, and onto advanced technology applications and deepening of theoretical models. Furthermore, analysis of research quality distribution indicates that Usage Experience and Assisted Living Technology have become core topics, while Smart Devices, Theoretical Models, and Mobile Health Applications point towards future research directions.

Through this study, we have systematically reviewed the dynamics, core issues, and evolutionary trends in the field of older adults’ technology acceptance, constructing a comprehensive Knowledge Mapping of the domain and presenting a clear framework of existing research. This not only lays the foundation for subsequent theoretical discussions and innovative applications in the field but also provides an important reference for relevant scholars.

Limitations

To our knowledge, this is the first bibliometric analysis concerning technology acceptance among older adults, and we adhered strictly to bibliometric standards throughout our research. However, this study relies on the Web of Science Core Collection, and while its authority and breadth are widely recognized, this choice may have missed relevant literature published in other significant databases such as PubMed, Scopus, and Google Scholar, potentially overlooking some critical academic contributions. Moreover, given that our analysis was confined to literature in English, it may not reflect studies published in other languages, somewhat limiting the global representativeness of our data sample.

It is noteworthy that with the rapid development of AI technology, its increasingly widespread application in elderly care services is significantly transforming traditional care models. AI is profoundly altering the lifestyles of the elderly, from health monitoring and smart diagnostics to intelligent home systems and personalized care, significantly enhancing their quality of life and health care standards. The potential for AI technology within the elderly population is immense, and research in this area is rapidly expanding. However, due to the restrictive nature of the search terms used in this study, it did not fully cover research in this critical area, particularly in addressing key issues such as trust, privacy, and ethics.

Consequently, future research should not only expand data sources, incorporating multilingual and multidatabase literature, but also particularly focus on exploring older adults’ acceptance of AI technology and its applications, in order to construct a more comprehensive academic landscape of older adults’ technology acceptance, thereby enriching and extending the knowledge system and academic trends in this field.

Data availability

The datasets analyzed during the current study are available in the Dataverse repository: https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/6K0GJH .

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Acknowledgements

This research was supported by the Social Science Foundation of Shaanxi Province in China (Grant No. 2023J014).

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Xianru Shang, Zijian Liu, Chen Gong, Zhigang Hu & Yuexuan Wu

Department of Education Information Technology, Faculty of Education, East China Normal University, Shanghai, China

Chengliang Wang

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Conceptualization, XS, YW, CW; methodology, XS, ZL, CG, CW; software, XS, CG, YW; writing-original draft preparation, XS, CW; writing-review and editing, XS, CG, ZH, CW; supervision, ZL, ZH, CW; project administration, ZL, ZH, CW; funding acquisition, XS, CG. All authors read and approved the final manuscript. All authors have read and approved the re-submission of the manuscript.

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Shang, X., Liu, Z., Gong, C. et al. Knowledge mapping and evolution of research on older adults’ technology acceptance: a bibliometric study from 2013 to 2023. Humanit Soc Sci Commun 11 , 1115 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-024-03658-2

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https://educationhub.blog.gov.uk/2024/08/20/gcse-results-day-2024-number-grading-system/

GCSE results day 2024: Everything you need to know including the number grading system

Thousands of students across the country will soon be finding out their GCSE results and thinking about the next steps in their education.   

Here we explain everything you need to know about the big day, from when results day is, to the current 9-1 grading scale, to what your options are if your results aren’t what you’re expecting.  

When is GCSE results day 2024?  

GCSE results day will be taking place on Thursday the 22 August.     

The results will be made available to schools on Wednesday and available to pick up from your school by 8am on Thursday morning.  

Schools will issue their own instructions on how and when to collect your results.   

When did we change to a number grading scale?  

The shift to the numerical grading system was introduced in England in 2017 firstly in English language, English literature, and maths.  

By 2020 all subjects were shifted to number grades. This means anyone with GCSE results from 2017-2020 will have a combination of both letters and numbers.  

The numerical grading system was to signal more challenging GCSEs and to better differentiate between students’ abilities - particularly at higher grades between the A *-C grades. There only used to be 4 grades between A* and C, now with the numerical grading scale there are 6.  

What do the number grades mean?  

The grades are ranked from 1, the lowest, to 9, the highest.  

The grades don’t exactly translate, but the two grading scales meet at three points as illustrated below.  

The bottom of grade 7 is aligned with the bottom of grade A, while the bottom of grade 4 is aligned to the bottom of grade C.    

Meanwhile, the bottom of grade 1 is aligned to the bottom of grade G.  

What to do if your results weren’t what you were expecting?  

If your results weren’t what you were expecting, firstly don’t panic. You have options.  

First things first, speak to your school or college – they could be flexible on entry requirements if you’ve just missed your grades.   

They’ll also be able to give you the best tailored advice on whether re-sitting while studying for your next qualifications is a possibility.   

If you’re really unhappy with your results you can enter to resit all GCSE subjects in summer 2025. You can also take autumn exams in GCSE English language and maths.  

Speak to your sixth form or college to decide when it’s the best time for you to resit a GCSE exam.  

Look for other courses with different grade requirements     

Entry requirements vary depending on the college and course. Ask your school for advice, and call your college or another one in your area to see if there’s a space on a course you’re interested in.    

Consider an apprenticeship    

Apprenticeships combine a practical training job with study too. They’re open to you if you’re 16 or over, living in England, and not in full time education.  

As an apprentice you’ll be a paid employee, have the opportunity to work alongside experienced staff, gain job-specific skills, and get time set aside for training and study related to your role.   

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The National Career Service is a free resource that can help you with your career planning. Give them a call to discuss potential routes into higher education, further education, or the workplace.   

Whatever your results, if you want to find out more about all your education and training options, as well as get practical advice about your exam results, visit the  National Careers Service page  and Skills for Careers to explore your study and work choices.   

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Literature Research: Literary Genres

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Literary Genres: USF.edu

Updated July, 2018

Literary Genres -- FICTION: CA Dept. of Education

Stories composed in verse or prose, usually for theatrical performance, where conflicts and emotion are expressed through dialogue and action.

Narration demonstrating a useful truth, especially in which animals speak as humans; legendary, supernatural tale.

Story about fairies or other magical creatures, usually for children.

Fiction with strange or other worldly settings or characters; fiction which invites suspension of reality.

Narrative literary works whose content is produced by the imagination and is not necessarily based on fact.

Fiction in Verse

Full-length novels with plot, subplot(s), theme(s), major and minor characters, in which the narrative is presented in (usually blank) verse form.

The songs, stories, myths, and proverbs of a people or "folk" as handed down by word of mouth.

Historical Fiction

Story with fictional characters and events in a historical setting.

Fiction in which events evoke a feeling of dread in both the characters and the reader.

Fiction full of fun, fancy, and excitement, meant to entertain; but can be contained in all genres

Story, sometimes of a national or folk hero, which has a basis in fact but also includes imaginative material.

Fiction dealing with the solution of a crime or the unraveling of secrets.

Legend or traditional narrative, often based in part on historical events, that reveals human behavior and natural phenomena by its symbolism; often pertaining to the actions of the gods.

Verse and rhythmic writing with imagery that creates emotional responses.

Realistic Fiction

Story that can actually happen and is true to life.

Science Fiction

Story based on impact of actual, imagined, or potential science, usually set in the future or on other planets.

Short Story

Fiction of such brevity that it supports no subplots.

Humorous story with blatant exaggerations, swaggering heroes who do the impossible with nonchalance.

Taken from: California Department of Education , Curriculum & Instruction, Curriculum Resources, 2017.

Non--Fiction CA Dept. of Education

Biography/Autobiography

Narrative of a person's life, a true story about a real person.

A short literary composition that reflects the author's outlook or point.

Narrative Nonfiction

Factual information presented in a format which tells a story.

Informational text dealing with an actual, real-life subject.

Public address or discourse.

Taken from: Taken from:  California Department of Education , Curriculum & Instruction, Curriculum Resources, 2017.

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• How to write a literary analysis essay | A step-by-step guide

How to Write a Literary Analysis Essay | A Step-by-Step Guide

Published on January 30, 2020 by Jack Caulfield . Revised on August 14, 2023.

Literary analysis means closely studying a text, interpreting its meanings, and exploring why the author made certain choices. It can be applied to novels, short stories, plays, poems, or any other form of literary writing.

A literary analysis essay is not a rhetorical analysis , nor is it just a summary of the plot or a book review. Instead, it is a type of argumentative essay where you need to analyze elements such as the language, perspective, and structure of the text, and explain how the author uses literary devices to create effects and convey ideas.

Before beginning a literary analysis essay, it’s essential to carefully read the text and c ome up with a thesis statement to keep your essay focused. As you write, follow the standard structure of an academic essay :

• An introduction that tells the reader what your essay will focus on.
• A main body, divided into paragraphs , that builds an argument using evidence from the text.
• A conclusion that clearly states the main point that you have shown with your analysis.

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Table of contents

Step 1: reading the text and identifying literary devices, step 2: coming up with a thesis, step 3: writing a title and introduction, step 4: writing the body of the essay, step 5: writing a conclusion, other interesting articles.

The first step is to carefully read the text(s) and take initial notes. As you read, pay attention to the things that are most intriguing, surprising, or even confusing in the writing—these are things you can dig into in your analysis.

Your goal in literary analysis is not simply to explain the events described in the text, but to analyze the writing itself and discuss how the text works on a deeper level. Primarily, you’re looking out for literary devices —textual elements that writers use to convey meaning and create effects. If you’re comparing and contrasting multiple texts, you can also look for connections between different texts.

To get started with your analysis, there are several key areas that you can focus on. As you analyze each aspect of the text, try to think about how they all relate to each other. You can use highlights or notes to keep track of important passages and quotes.

Language choices

Consider what style of language the author uses. Are the sentences short and simple or more complex and poetic?

What word choices stand out as interesting or unusual? Are words used figuratively to mean something other than their literal definition? Figurative language includes things like metaphor (e.g. “her eyes were oceans”) and simile (e.g. “her eyes were like oceans”).

Also keep an eye out for imagery in the text—recurring images that create a certain atmosphere or symbolize something important. Remember that language is used in literary texts to say more than it means on the surface.

Narrative voice

Ask yourself:

• Who is telling the story?
• How are they telling it?

Is it a first-person narrator (“I”) who is personally involved in the story, or a third-person narrator who tells us about the characters from a distance?

Consider the narrator’s perspective . Is the narrator omniscient (where they know everything about all the characters and events), or do they only have partial knowledge? Are they an unreliable narrator who we are not supposed to take at face value? Authors often hint that their narrator might be giving us a distorted or dishonest version of events.

The tone of the text is also worth considering. Is the story intended to be comic, tragic, or something else? Are usually serious topics treated as funny, or vice versa ? Is the story realistic or fantastical (or somewhere in between)?

Consider how the text is structured, and how the structure relates to the story being told.

• Novels are often divided into chapters and parts.
• Poems are divided into lines, stanzas, and sometime cantos.
• Plays are divided into scenes and acts.

Think about why the author chose to divide the different parts of the text in the way they did.

There are also less formal structural elements to take into account. Does the story unfold in chronological order, or does it jump back and forth in time? Does it begin in medias res —in the middle of the action? Does the plot advance towards a clearly defined climax?

With poetry, consider how the rhyme and meter shape your understanding of the text and your impression of the tone. Try reading the poem aloud to get a sense of this.

In a play, you might consider how relationships between characters are built up through different scenes, and how the setting relates to the action. Watch out for  dramatic irony , where the audience knows some detail that the characters don’t, creating a double meaning in their words, thoughts, or actions.

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Your thesis in a literary analysis essay is the point you want to make about the text. It’s the core argument that gives your essay direction and prevents it from just being a collection of random observations about a text.

If you’re given a prompt for your essay, your thesis must answer or relate to the prompt. For example:

Essay question example

Is Franz Kafka’s “Before the Law” a religious parable?

Your thesis statement should be an answer to this question—not a simple yes or no, but a statement of why this is or isn’t the case:

Thesis statement example

Franz Kafka’s “Before the Law” is not a religious parable, but a story about bureaucratic alienation.

Sometimes you’ll be given freedom to choose your own topic; in this case, you’ll have to come up with an original thesis. Consider what stood out to you in the text; ask yourself questions about the elements that interested you, and consider how you might answer them.

Your thesis should be something arguable—that is, something that you think is true about the text, but which is not a simple matter of fact. It must be complex enough to develop through evidence and arguments across the course of your essay.

Say you’re analyzing the novel Frankenstein . You could start by asking yourself:

Your initial answer might be a surface-level description:

The character Frankenstein is portrayed negatively in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein .

However, this statement is too simple to be an interesting thesis. After reading the text and analyzing its narrative voice and structure, you can develop the answer into a more nuanced and arguable thesis statement:

Mary Shelley uses shifting narrative perspectives to portray Frankenstein in an increasingly negative light as the novel goes on. While he initially appears to be a naive but sympathetic idealist, after the creature’s narrative Frankenstein begins to resemble—even in his own telling—the thoughtlessly cruel figure the creature represents him as.

Remember that you can revise your thesis statement throughout the writing process , so it doesn’t need to be perfectly formulated at this stage. The aim is to keep you focused as you analyze the text.

Finding textual evidence

To support your thesis statement, your essay will build an argument using textual evidence —specific parts of the text that demonstrate your point. This evidence is quoted and analyzed throughout your essay to explain your argument to the reader.

It can be useful to comb through the text in search of relevant quotations before you start writing. You might not end up using everything you find, and you may have to return to the text for more evidence as you write, but collecting textual evidence from the beginning will help you to structure your arguments and assess whether they’re convincing.

To start your literary analysis paper, you’ll need two things: a good title, and an introduction.

Your title should clearly indicate what your analysis will focus on. It usually contains the name of the author and text(s) you’re analyzing. Keep it as concise and engaging as possible.

A common approach to the title is to use a relevant quote from the text, followed by a colon and then the rest of your title.

If you struggle to come up with a good title at first, don’t worry—this will be easier once you’ve begun writing the essay and have a better sense of your arguments.

“Fearful symmetry” : The violence of creation in William Blake’s “The Tyger”

The introduction

The essay introduction provides a quick overview of where your argument is going. It should include your thesis statement and a summary of the essay’s structure.

A typical structure for an introduction is to begin with a general statement about the text and author, using this to lead into your thesis statement. You might refer to a commonly held idea about the text and show how your thesis will contradict it, or zoom in on a particular device you intend to focus on.

Then you can end with a brief indication of what’s coming up in the main body of the essay. This is called signposting. It will be more elaborate in longer essays, but in a short five-paragraph essay structure, it shouldn’t be more than one sentence.

Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is often read as a crude cautionary tale about the dangers of scientific advancement unrestrained by ethical considerations. In this reading, protagonist Victor Frankenstein is a stable representation of the callous ambition of modern science throughout the novel. This essay, however, argues that far from providing a stable image of the character, Shelley uses shifting narrative perspectives to portray Frankenstein in an increasingly negative light as the novel goes on. While he initially appears to be a naive but sympathetic idealist, after the creature’s narrative Frankenstein begins to resemble—even in his own telling—the thoughtlessly cruel figure the creature represents him as. This essay begins by exploring the positive portrayal of Frankenstein in the first volume, then moves on to the creature’s perception of him, and finally discusses the third volume’s narrative shift toward viewing Frankenstein as the creature views him.

Some students prefer to write the introduction later in the process, and it’s not a bad idea. After all, you’ll have a clearer idea of the overall shape of your arguments once you’ve begun writing them!

If you do write the introduction first, you should still return to it later to make sure it lines up with what you ended up writing, and edit as necessary.

The body of your essay is everything between the introduction and conclusion. It contains your arguments and the textual evidence that supports them.

Paragraph structure

A typical structure for a high school literary analysis essay consists of five paragraphs : the three paragraphs of the body, plus the introduction and conclusion.

Each paragraph in the main body should focus on one topic. In the five-paragraph model, try to divide your argument into three main areas of analysis, all linked to your thesis. Don’t try to include everything you can think of to say about the text—only analysis that drives your argument.

In longer essays, the same principle applies on a broader scale. For example, you might have two or three sections in your main body, each with multiple paragraphs. Within these sections, you still want to begin new paragraphs at logical moments—a turn in the argument or the introduction of a new idea.

Robert’s first encounter with Gil-Martin suggests something of his sinister power. Robert feels “a sort of invisible power that drew me towards him.” He identifies the moment of their meeting as “the beginning of a series of adventures which has puzzled myself, and will puzzle the world when I am no more in it” (p. 89). Gil-Martin’s “invisible power” seems to be at work even at this distance from the moment described; before continuing the story, Robert feels compelled to anticipate at length what readers will make of his narrative after his approaching death. With this interjection, Hogg emphasizes the fatal influence Gil-Martin exercises from his first appearance.

Topic sentences

To keep your points focused, it’s important to use a topic sentence at the beginning of each paragraph.

A good topic sentence allows a reader to see at a glance what the paragraph is about. It can introduce a new line of argument and connect or contrast it with the previous paragraph. Transition words like “however” or “moreover” are useful for creating smooth transitions:

… The story’s focus, therefore, is not upon the divine revelation that may be waiting beyond the door, but upon the mundane process of aging undergone by the man as he waits.

Nevertheless, the “radiance” that appears to stream from the door is typically treated as religious symbolism.

This topic sentence signals that the paragraph will address the question of religious symbolism, while the linking word “nevertheless” points out a contrast with the previous paragraph’s conclusion.

Using textual evidence

A key part of literary analysis is backing up your arguments with relevant evidence from the text. This involves introducing quotes from the text and explaining their significance to your point.

It’s important to contextualize quotes and explain why you’re using them; they should be properly introduced and analyzed, not treated as self-explanatory:

It isn’t always necessary to use a quote. Quoting is useful when you’re discussing the author’s language, but sometimes you’ll have to refer to plot points or structural elements that can’t be captured in a short quote.

In these cases, it’s more appropriate to paraphrase or summarize parts of the text—that is, to describe the relevant part in your own words:

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The conclusion of your analysis shouldn’t introduce any new quotations or arguments. Instead, it’s about wrapping up the essay. Here, you summarize your key points and try to emphasize their significance to the reader.

A good way to approach this is to briefly summarize your key arguments, and then stress the conclusion they’ve led you to, highlighting the new perspective your thesis provides on the text as a whole:

If you want to know more about AI tools , college essays , or fallacies make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples or go directly to our tools!

• Ad hominem fallacy
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By tracing the depiction of Frankenstein through the novel’s three volumes, I have demonstrated how the narrative structure shifts our perception of the character. While the Frankenstein of the first volume is depicted as having innocent intentions, the second and third volumes—first in the creature’s accusatory voice, and then in his own voice—increasingly undermine him, causing him to appear alternately ridiculous and vindictive. Far from the one-dimensional villain he is often taken to be, the character of Frankenstein is compelling because of the dynamic narrative frame in which he is placed. In this frame, Frankenstein’s narrative self-presentation responds to the images of him we see from others’ perspectives. This conclusion sheds new light on the novel, foregrounding Shelley’s unique layering of narrative perspectives and its importance for the depiction of character.

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Recovering contemporary genre histories – the development of chick lit as seen through the internet archive’s wayback machine and wikipedia’s history page

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• Published: 11 May 2021
• Volume 2 , pages 25–42, ( 2021 )

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In the perception of literary scholars, the investigation of genre histories is still closely linked to ‘offline’ archival work. However, the Internet has been publicly accessible since 1991, and over the last thirty years, numerous new literary genres have emerged. They have often been proclaimed, defined, spread, marketed, criticized, and even pronounced dead online. By now, a great deal of this digital material is said to have disappeared. What many scholars do not consider, however, is that parts of the web are archived, for example by the Internet Archive and Wikipedia, which make their archives publicly available via the Wayback Machine and the history page respectively. This makes it possible to track early online definitions of contemporary genres and their development. In this paper, I will use the chick lit genre, which emerged in the second half of the 1990s, as a case study to show the benefits of including web archives in the reconstruction of contemporary genre histories. An analysis of both the first extensive and long-running fan websites, which are now offline but well-documented in the Internet Archive, and the history page of the Wikipedia article on chick lit will challenge some of the narratives that have long dominated chick lit research.

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1 Introduction

With genre history, one inevitably thinks of good old ‘dusty’ archival work. In literary studies, archives and libraries are still most often imagined as physical spaces and often compared to archaeological activities. Susan Stanford Friedman, for example, employs the metaphor of recovery for “locating long unavailable texts buried in the bowels of libraries and collections; little magazines even more ephemeral than the better known ones; anthologies or catalogues reflecting networks parallel to those in the West; personal papers of forgotten writers, editors, and curators;” ( 2012 , 510). What this list of possible archival sources omits, is that many of these materials have now been digitized and can be accessed online, albeit sometimes with restrictions that vary according to academic affiliation or location. Although the Internet has great democratic potential, its distribution and accessibility – about 57% of the world’s population was online in 2019 – is still very unevenly spread across the globe and across different social classes (Kemp, 2019 ). In principle, however, the Internet has been publicly accessible since 1991.

In terms of genre history, this means that many new literary genres that have emerged in the meantime coincided with the ongoing development of the web, where they have often been proclaimed, defined, spread, marketed, criticized, and even pronounced dead via a wide variety of actors and media. These include fans and their websites or blogs, online presences of newspapers, magazines, or publishing houses, and also the free encyclopedia Wikipedia . A great deal of digital material from the early 2000s – a time when the Internet had already assumed an indispensable role in the book sector – has now allegedly disappeared: many fans have at some point stopped running their websites; newspapers and magazines only started to systematically archive later and often have not made these records available for free use; publishers and their imprints, if they have not disappeared, have meanwhile updated their websites several times; and Wikipedia, as a collaboratively developed project, is constantly changing anyway. According to Aleida Assmann, the Internet and the archive are complementary institutions: “the archive fulfills the desire for reliable material preservation and long-term storage of information; the Internet fulfills the desire for an acceleration of the data flow and lightning-fast and targeted access to information.” Footnote 1 ( 2009 , 174; my transl.) What many Humanities scholars do not know or, out of skepticism about the Internet as a ‘reliable’ academic source, simply do not consider, is that parts of the web are archived, for example by the Internet Archive, a non-profit library of free books, movies, software, music, and websites based in San Francisco. Their Wayback Machine is a service which, since its launch in 2001, has allowed users to go back in time and see what websites, some of which no longer exist, looked like at an earlier date. Wikipedia, which was also founded in 2001, has its own built-in archive, the history page , through which (almost) all versions of a Wikipedia article since its creation can be accessed. Footnote 2 In relation to the field of genre history, we can thus in many cases trace the first, or at least very early, mentions of new genres, their discussion and definition by fans or critics, and the development of Wikipedia articles about them. This applies above all to the examination of popular genres or ‘genre fiction’ (in contrast to ‘literary fiction’ or ‘literature’) that is usually not discussed in the feature pages of prestigious newspapers and magazines but has a strong fan base which is very active online. Footnote 3

In this paper, I will use the chick lit genre, which emerged in the second half of the 1990s with bestsellers such as Helen Fielding’s Bridget Jones’s Diary and Candace Bushnell’s Sex and the City (both 1996), as a case study to show the benefits of including web archives in the recovery of contemporary genre histories. An analysis of both the first large and long-running fan websites, chicklit.co.uk ( 2002 –2014) and chicklitbooks.com ( 2003 –2015), through the Wayback Machine, and the history page of the Wikipedia article on chick lit (2004–now) will challenge some of the narratives that have long dominated chick lit research; especially, the unquestioning adoration by fans as well as the allegedly narrow, one-sided, and therefore academically irrelevant definitions of the chick lit genre published online. On a more general level, the aim of this paper is to present a critical comparative approach to the inclusion of archived web sources in the study of contemporary literary genres.

2 Early definitions of chick lit or the not so unquestioning adoration of its fans

When chick lit began to develop into a genre in the second half of the 1990s and early 2000s, journalists, fans, and Wikipedians were the first to comment on it, often online. Research, or at least the published research results, came much later. Annette Peitz, who wrote one of the earliest scholarly monographs on chick lit, disparagingly refers to those early comments as “utterly banal sources of definition” ( 2010 , 27–28; my transl.), useful only in so far as they “determine current trends quickly and in a broadly intelligible way” (ibid., 28), often “before academic sources can address them in a scholarly manner” (ibid., footnote 29). Footnote 4 The editors of the first academic collection of articles on chick lit, Suzanne Ferriss and Mallory Young, already provided an implicit reason for the skepticism about such early sources, which they describe as extremely polarized and therefore as biased: “On the one hand chick lit attracts the unquestioning adoration of fans; on the other it attracts the unmitigated disdain of critics.” ( 2006 , 1) It was precisely the uncompromising rejection on the part of both critics and also renowned authors such as Doris Lessing or Beryl Bainbridge – who called chick lit “instantly forgettable” (quoted in Staff & Agencies, 2001 ) and “a froth sort of thing” (ibid.) – that created a strong desire among the fans to characterize it. Therefore, the first definitions of the genre can be found on their websites, with chicklit.co.uk (UK, 2002 –2014) and chicklitbooks.com (USA, 2003 –2015) being the two most popular and, with an online presence of over a decade, also the most durable ones. Wikipedia can look back on an even longer online presence. Although the article on chick lit was published in 2004, two to three years later than the fan websites, it is still available online today.

However, as Peitz’ or Ferriss and Young’s statements already indicate, scholars only used these sources because no better ones were available yet; references remained mostly anecdotal and selective and were in no way systematic. If the websites had not been archived and made accessible either by the Internet Archive and its Wayback Machine or by Wikipedia’s history page, their content – with the exception of a few second hand quotations Footnote 5 – would have been lost for research today. Since the Humanities have so far not given much attention to non-academic web sources, this ‘loss’ may not seem particularly relevant at first. However, in literary and cultural studies, and especially in genre history, the first mentions and definitions of a genre are considered highly relevant. I would argue that this convention does not have to be ignored just because the medium (digital instead of analog) and the actors (non-professionals instead of professionals) have changed. In the case of the two fan websites and Wikipedia, moreover, it is not only their early definitions that are relevant, but also their continuous preoccupation with the genre, which extends from the time of the genre’s creation and consolidation until after its alleged ‘death’. Footnote 6

2.1 Digitally archived chick lit fan websites

The British chicklit.co.uk was online from 2002 to 2014. A search with the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine reveals that from the very beginning the genre was defined as entertaining or very marketable “contemporary women’s fiction” (“Home and Competitions”, 6 Nov. 2002 ). The books advertised on the website mostly revolved around the everyday challenges of their young protagonists: the search for Mr. Right, relationship problems, family planning, self-realization, and career planning (ibid.). Although the focus was on chick lit, the concept was interpreted more broadly, in the sense of a chick culture , which was later defined by Ferriss and Young as “a group of mostly American and British popular culture media forms focused primarily on twenty-to-thirtysomething middleclass women” ( 2008 , 1). In addition to the popular formats of chick lit, chick flick, and chick TV programming, this chick culture could also be communicated via other media such as blogs, music, magazines, and even car designs or energy drinks. What Ferriss and Young were missing, however, is that media such as blogs and websites do not only communicate chick culture, but also actively (re)shape and combine its various forms. Accordingly, the founder of chicklit.co.uk , Paula Gardner, described the website a few years after its launch as “the online women’s magazine that celebrates 21st century woman’s contemporary fiction and lifestyle” (“Home”, 3 Feb. 2006 ). In addition to authors and their books, lifestyle topics such as fashion, beauty, personal hygiene, nutrition, but also other media such as film and music were included. These focal points, which went beyond literature and were presented as modern female everyday practices, make it possible to draw conclusions about the settings in chick lit and thus implicitly contribute to the definition of the genre: literature by, about, and for the young woman of the twenty-first century who wants to be up to date in lifestyle issues and popular culture. Chicklit.co.uk did not only provide a broad definition of chick lit as part of a chick culture, but also as a genre that narratively processes, reflects, and brings forth this culture.

The changing mottos that preceded the start page of the American fan website chicklitbooks.com ( 2003 –2015) – “It’s hip. It’s smart. It’s fun. It’s about you!” (16 June 2004a ), “Hip, bright literature for today’s modern woman” (3 June 2005b ), “Hip, smart fiction for women” (14 Oct. 2006 ), or “Smart, fun & modern fiction for females” (1 Aug. 2009 ) – convey a similar understanding of chick lit as part of a broader chick culture. However, Rian Montgomery, the website’s founder and operator from 2003 to 2013, also provided a concrete genre description from the first year of chicklitbooks.com ’s existence:

Let me start out by telling you what Chick Lit is NOT:

Lame and ridiculous

Cheesy romance novels

Bad influence on women

Brain-numbing fluff

I’m not speaking for all books with the above criteria – there are some really bad Chick-Lit novels out there. For the most part however, the books are entertaining, interesting, and many women can identify with them. The plots usually involve a woman in her 20s or 30s, going through everyday problems and challenges with her boyfriend, job, living situation, marriage, dating life, etc. (“FAQ”, 11 Oct. 2003 )

Two conclusions regarding the development of chick lit can be drawn from this partly negative definition. First, there seems to have been a need to justify chick lit as a genre and to defend it against accusations such as being trivial or even anti-feminist. Second, at that time the plot of chick lit novels revolved largely around the protagonists’ relationships with men. In the following years, however, chick lit was also explicitly differentiated from romance – “A lot of chick lit usually has a romantic story line to it, but it’s rarely all that the book is about.” (“What is Chick Lit?”, 9 Dec. 2004b ) – and from women’s fiction, which was usually less confidential/personal in tone and, unlike chick lit, did not have a constitutive element of humor (“What is Chick Lit?”, 9 Feb. 2005a ).

The reconstruction of early genre definitions on the fan websites with the help of the Wayback Machine shows that from the very beginning the operators endeavored to place chick lit in a larger cultural (esp. chicklit.co.uk ) or literary historical context (esp. chicklitbooks.com ). This makes these archived websites remarkable sources for academic genre research, as they not only demonstrate early, but also nuanced negotiations of the genre (connection to other cultural artifacts and media, defense mechanisms, differentiation from other genres).

2.2 Academic sources as a basis for comparison

The early definitions on the archived websites overall make a balanced impression and do not seem like the “unquestioning adoration” (Ferriss & Young,  2006 , 1) of fans. In fact, they are relatively consistent with early academic attempts at definition and what became known as the ‘chick lit formula’: confessional, ironic, and humorous narratives about young metropolitan women in their 20/30s – white, heterosexual, and affluent – who face the everyday challenges of their careers and the search for Mr. Right along with their friends (see, for example, Ferriss & Young, 2006 , 3; Peitz, 2010 , 38–39). Overall, there seems to have been a kind of consensus among authors, fans, journalists, and scholars about the central constituents of the chick lit genre. To depict such a minimal definition is, in due course, the task of tertiary sources such as literary encyclopedias, handbooks, or dictionaries. The chick lit article in the Oxford Dictionary of Literary Terms (2008), which is probably the first academic tertiary representation of the genre, however, turned out to be surprisingly biased and more reminiscent of the “unmitigated disdain of critics” ( 2006 , 1) that Ferriss and Young considered no less problematic for a genre definition than the one-sided adoration of its fans. The author of the article, Chris Baldick, defines chick lit as

[a] kind of light commercial fiction addressed to British women readers of the late 1990s and early 2000s and subsequently imitated in the United States and beyond. The term appeared from 1996 as a flippant counterpart to the lad-lit fiction of that time. The defining model for the genre was Helen Fielding’s comic novel Bridget Jones’s Diary (1996) [...]. Chick-lit novels are written by women about the misadventures of contemporary unmarried working women in their 20s or 30s who struggle with multiple pressures from reproachful mothers, inadequate boyfriends, and tyrannical bosses while consoling themselves with shopping trips, chocolate, and erotic daydreams. The stories are commonly told in the first person in tones of humorous self-deprecation. As the boom in this kind of fiction, sometimes referred to as chic fic , continued into the early 21st century, new subgenres emerged, including ‘nanny lit’ and ‘mommy lit’. (Baldick, 2015a , [2008], 57–58; emphasis in original)

Considering that this is an article in a prestigious academic dictionary and not the intervention of a literary critic, one can only wonder about the inherent national and male chauvinism. The latter is even more evident in the corresponding article on “lad lit”, in which Baldick writes that “[s]ince British lad lit arrived in the USA slightly later than the more successful first wave of chick lit, it was mistakenly believed to be a backlash against the Bridget Jones phenomenon; in fact the correct answer to the question ‘which came first, the chick or the lad?’ is: the lad.” ( 2015b [2008], 195). His argument is flawed. First, the US-American counterpart to Bridget Jones’s Diary , Candace Bushnell’s Sex and the City (1996), can hardly be called an imitation. On the one hand, the narrative situation and the constellation of characters in the latter differs substantially from the diary-writing Bridget in Fielding’s novel Footnote 7 ; on the other, Bushnell’s column, which was published in the New York Observer from 1994 to 1996 and formed the basis for her novel, appeared one year before Fielding’s column in The Independent (1995–97). Chronologically speaking, Sex and the City – and thus US-American chick lit – came first. The same applies to the term chick lit, which the American novelists and scholars Cris Mazza and Jeffrey DeShell coined in their anthology Chick Lit: Postfeminist Fiction (1995), Footnote 8 a compilation of short stories by female authors, which can be described as experimental and very different from what would later become popular as chick lit (see also Mazza, 2006 ). Mazza describes the aim of the anthology as a search “for something different, something that stretched the boundaries of what has been considered ‘women’s writing’, something that might simply be called ‘writing’ without defining it by gender, and yet at the same time speak the diversity and depth of what women writers can produce rather than what they’re expected to produce” (Mazza, 1995 , 8). This rather subversive use of the term ‘chick lit’ is completely omitted in Baldick’s definition. Moreover, he mistakenly reduces the ambivalent and complex history of the label to a mere commercially calculated reaction to the British lad lit ; a genre, which, oddly enough, is described by other scholars as almost the reverse: “as the extent of chick lit’s remarkable ability to transform itself into new varieties” (Ferriss & Young, 2006 , 7). With the words “Now, it seems men are getting in on the act […]” (“ladlit”, 1 June 2003 ), chicklit.co.uk had similarly commented on the emergence of lad lit , one of several subgenres to which they dedicated a subpage.

2.3 Wikipedia’s history page and chick lit

An important correction to the idiosyncratic genre history in the Oxford Dictionary of Literary Terms can be found in Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia that, according to its slogan, “anyone can edit” and that today provides over six million articles in the English language version – one of them being the article on chick lit which has been online since 22 July 2004. This early date of publication – one to two years after the launch of the fan websites, but before any academic publications on the topic appeared – makes the Wikipedia entry the very first encyclopedic article on chick lit. A study of its history page, which archives the genesis of the article, shows that already some of its earliest versions provide important information about the genre’s history. In the first two to three years of the article’s existence (2004–2006), without citing sources it already implicitly referred to Mazza’s and DeShell’s subversive use of the term. Specifically, the article points out that “‘[c]hick lit’ has also been claimed as a type of ‘postfeminist’ fiction, perhaps in an attempt to rehabilitate its literary reputation” (22 July 2004 ). Then from December 2006 onwards, it directly references Chick Lit: Postfeminist Fiction (Mazza & DeShell, 1995 ) in the section “Origins of the term”.

By comparing the different versions of the Wikipedia article on chick lit (see extracts in Table 1 ), it becomes clear that Baldick could have already consulted Wikipedia, while writing his encyclopedia article. His primarily student readership, who were most certainly often reminded not to rely on Wikipedia, would also have found some valuable advice there. To be fair, at times the article also presented strange (non-)information, such as the assumption “that the reader is likely to be the sort of clichéed nonintellectual female who chews gum and avoids serious literature” (22 July 2004 ) or that the term chick lit sounds “hauntingly similar to ‘chocolate’ and reminds one of chocolaty ‘sweetness’” (4 May 2006b ). However, the chick lit article is mostly in line with Wikipedia’s general upward trend of quality Footnote 9 (Wikipedia: “Researching with Wikipedia”, 21 April 2020a ): Both of these claims did not last long compared to the correct information regarding the origin of the term. The latter addition regarding chick lit’s chocolaty sweetness disappeared after only eleven days on 14 May 2006; the former was deleted on 22 April 2006, after an editor on the talk page – another useful tool that shows most of the article-related discussions between editors – made the following criticism: “Is there really a stereotype about the chewers of chiclet gum? Why does the term chick lit imply that the people who read it avoid other literature, are unintellectual, and cliched? Seems like the person who wrote the connotations section has opinions about chick lit.” (“Talk: Chick lit”, 3 Jan. 2006a ) Wikipedia may be a free encyclopedia that anyone can edit, but it has its own control mechanisms: on the one hand, any editor can question, modify, or delete changes to an article; on the other, there are also several levels of “volunteer stewardship” Footnote 10 such as the position of administrator (Wikipedia: “Wikipedia”, 20 July 2020g ). Footnote 11

A major advantage of Wikipedia – especially with regard to popular genres and genre fiction – is that it “goes beyond the boundaries of an old-fashioned educational canon and embraces the zeitgeist, pop culture and the subcultures of geeks, nerds and all kinds of hobbyists” Footnote 12 (Van Dijk, 2015 , 3; my transl.). This is a stark contrast to the Oxford Dictionary of Literary Terms , which includes terms from literary popular culture such as chick lit, but does not exactly embrace these phenomena and in fact may even be overly dismissive of them. Although Wikipedia also tends to reproduce an existing literary canon of values (cf. Hube et al., 2017 ; Wojcik & Picard, 2019 Footnote 13 ) and structural inequalities such as gender and racial bias, Footnote 14 there is more space for new, less established, and also anti-canonical topics, which, according to the encyclopedia’s guidelines, should be described “from a neutral point of view (NPOV)” (Wikipedia: “Neutral point of view”, 12 July 2020f ), Footnote 15 as is the ideal for all articles in the encyclopedia. However, such an almost neutral perspective usually takes several years to develop. This is not possible with academic publishing. Although tertiary sources are occasionally revised and expanded, the extent of such revisions usually depends on the resources of the editors and authors, which may be very limited, especially if their involvement with the topic in question dates back several years. The Oxford Dictionary of Literary Terms , for example, was reprinted in 2015. However, the revisions did not affect the article on chick lit, which was left exactly as it was originally published in 2008. One of the great advantages of web sources such as fan websites and Wikipedia compared to academic print and digital publications is that they regularly update and revise their content. Thanks to web archives, researchers are able to trace and critically evaluate these developments.

3 The evolution of the chick lit definition or the transparency of web archives

3.1 chick lit as women’s fiction.

In the early attempts to define the genre, the focus was mainly on a kind of ‘pure’ chick lit of the early 2000s. However, especially the fan websites, which initially tried to identify chick lit as an independent genre and distinguish it from romance and women’s fiction, were quick to react to changes and continuously adapted their definition of chick lit. On chicklitbooks.com , the restriction to young women in their 20s and 30s was already removed in 2004, just one year after the launch of the website: “A great many of the books [...] feature young single heroines looking for love, but more and more books are having married women, older women, and mothers as the main characters.” (“What is Chick Lit?“, 9 Dec. 2004b ). The last update of the subpage “What is chick lit?” (22 Sept. 2012 ) goes even further by emphasizing the general openness and flexibility of chick lit:

Chick lit is smart, fun fiction for and/or about women of all ages. Story lines often revolve around jobs, children, motherhood, romance, fame, living in the ‘big city’, friendship, dieting and much more, usually with a touch of humor thrown in. Many of these books are written from a first-person viewpoint, making them a bit more personal and realistic. The plots can range from being very light and fast-paced to being extraordinarily deep, thought-provoking and/or moving.

In 2007, chicklit.co.uk also distanced itself from its earlier definition of the genre. The owner of the website, Paula Gardner, pointed out that “pure chicklit […] has changed so much that we now want to celebrate women’s writings and women’s lives, per se, whether they fall into the traditional ‘chicklit’ category or not” (“About us”, 15 July 2007 ). These altered definitions already approached the vague catch-all term of women’s fiction – fiction by, about, and/or for women – that chick lit only came to be associated with in research several years later. For example, take Sorcha Gunne, who wrote about the immense global popularity of “[w]omen’s commercial fiction, or ‘chick lit’ as it has become known” ( 2016 , 241) or Heike Missler, who also recognized a tendency to define chick lit more inclusively, quasi-synonymously with women’s fiction ( 2016 , 70). What distinguishes Missler from other chick lit scholars so far is that she already came to her conclusions by including chick lit blogs in her research and by conducting a special survey among bloggers. However, neither Wikipedia nor fan-websites such as chicklitbooks.com and chicklit.co.uk , which at that time were already offline and only accessible via the Internet Archive, were part of her analysis.

Yet the free encyclopedia in particular represents one of the most suitable websites for tracing the evolution of chick lit or any other contemporary genre that has emerged in the digital age. Although the fan websites were created earlier and are therefore indispensable sources of information, especially for the very first attempts at definition, the free encyclopedia has the advantage of a decidedly collaborative and dynamic definition and, as a tertiary source, also claims to represent already proven facts in a neutral way. There were also guest editors and reviewers involved in the fan websites, but their number was limited – at least compared to the 84 authors of the chick lit article on Wikipedia Footnote 16 (Wikipedia: “Chick lit, Authorship”, 22 June 2020d ) – as was their influence on the exact definition of the genre, which was worded and published by the operators. While chicklit.co.uk and chicklitbooks.com both went offline in 2014/15, the Wikipedia article has been constantly revised and updated since 2004. Initially narrowly defined as popular fiction, genre fiction, or a subcategory of women’s fiction aimed at a limited target group of young women (see extracts in Table 1 ), the current definition is very broad:

Chick lit or chick literature is genre fiction, which “consists of heroine-centered narratives that focus on the trials and tribulations of their individual protagonists” [1] . The genre often addresses issues of modern womanhood – from romantic relationships to female friendships to matters in the workplace – in humorous and lighthearted ways [2] . At its onset, chick lit’s protagonists tended to be “single, white, heterosexual, British and American women in their late twenties and early thirties, living in metropolitan areas” [1] (22 June  2020c ; emphasis and footnotes in the original)

Compared to the first definition on Wikipedia, in which chick lit was identified as a “slightly uncomplimentary term” (22 July 2004 ) in the first sentence, the promotion from ‘lit’ to ‘literature’ is particularily striking. Thus, similar to chicklitbooks.com , the genre is granted a certain qualitative spectrum. The fact that the current Wikipedia definition refers to two scholarly publications – Caroline Smith’s book Cosmopolitan Culture and Consumerism in Chick Lit ( 2008 ) [footnote 1 in the block quotation above] and a review by Jessica L. Hooten of Ferriss’ and Young’s chick lit anthology (Ferriss & Young, 2006 ) [footnote 2 in the block quotation above] – already indicates that the editors have increasingly included scholarly literature – a development that can be followed very well on the history page of the article. While its first version was completely without bibliography, there are now 24 individual references and another two academic articles are recommended under the sub-heading “Further Reading” (22 June 2020c ). Although Wikipedia articles are never finished and tend to improve over time, an analysis of the history page can also reveal notable exceptions to this general upward trend of quality.

3.2 Gender and racial bias

While chicklitbooks.com stressed that chick lit was literature for and/or about women and chicklit.co.uk emphasized the ‘by and about women’, the definition on Wikipedia since 2009 has focused on the gender of the narrators and protagonists, who, as is added later in the article, can differ greatly “in ethnicity, age, social status, marital status, career, and religion” (22 June 2020c ). A definition that focuses more on content and characters than on the gender of authors and readers is not only more productive from a literary studies’ point of view, but also breaks with stereotypes such as that women – simply because they are women – prefer to write and read romance and chick lit novels. In February 2014, an amendment to the Wikipedia article (which has since been deleted) explicitly emphasized that chick lit was not exclusively written by female authors: “recently there have been some male-authored novels, such as Zack Love’s ‘Sex in the Title’, that center on the traditional themes of chick lit: dating, relationships, and love.” (11 Feb. 2014 ) It comes as no surprise that men also write chick lit. In the same way that female authors who write in traditionally male genres such as fantasy or science fiction often use gender-neutral names (e.g. Robin Hobb, J. K. Rowling), male authors such as Alex Coleman (aka Damien Owens) or Chris Dyer (aka Christopher Santos) choose gender-neutral pseudonyms to publish chick lit or women’s fiction and romance. What was new and interesting about the development mentioned on Wikipedia was therefore not that male authors wrote in ‘female’ genres, but that they were able to do so openly and without a pseudonym. This conclusion has since been relativized by the deletion of that paragraph on 1 September 2016 without specific justification or prior discussion. Nevertheless, it can be said that gender bias, especially derogatory remarks and prejudices about chick lit as a ‘women’s genre’, have decreased over the years.

However, there is still a need to catch up in terms of the genre’s diversity and its wide international spread. The current Wikipedia article does not mention chick lit by women of color such as African American, Latin American and Asian American authors or chick lit from the global South. And while the misinformation that “British author Catherine Alliott’s The Old Girl Network (1994) was the start of the chick lit genre” (22 June 2020c ) has persisted for some time now (since 18 Jan. 2018, to be exact), the important role of African American chick lit or sistah lit – and in particular Terry McMillan’s novel Waiting to Exhale (1992) – for the genre’s genealogy still has not been addressed (Hurt, 2019b ). On 26 September 2013 an editor named Jcross 12 added a new section entitled “Criticism” to the chick lit article, in which they address the whiteness not only of the genre, but also of the discourse that surrounds it:

Common criticism that arises from this genre is the emphasis of western liberal views [7] . The plot typically centers on a ‘white’ woman’s narrative of the issues that surround her [8] . Critics argue that these stories often reflect a fixation on consumerism of [sic] designer brands and sexuality rather than addressing global issues such as equality [9] . Although there are subsections of this genre that include protagonist [sic] of various ethnicities, cultures, and backgrounds, these generally fall second to the dominant ‘white’ chick lit [10] . […] (emphasis and footnotes in the original)

The section ends with the statement that “[t]he women of color genre of chick lit is becoming increasingly important as it presents questions regarding the issues these women must deal with that relate to race, the state and political economy, even if it is in a fictional sense [14] ” (ibid.). This critical addition to the article was backed up by a trustworthy academic source: Pamela Butler’s and Jigna Desai’s acclaimed article Manolos, Marriage, and Mantras: Chick-Lit Criticism and Transnational Feminism (2008), published in the prestigious interdisciplinary journal Meridians: Feminism, Race, and Transnationalism.

Two years later, however, an editor with the nickname Amakuru deleted the entire section, giving the dubious reason that “[t]his article doesn’t currently have enough detail on the matter itself to warrant a detailed ‘criticism’ section” (“Chick lit: Revision history”, 10 Dec. 2015c ). The same editor substantiated the deletion by referring to a previous discussion about the section’s (ir)relevance on the talk page of the article. However, this ‘discussion’ was actually limited to a highly problematic and insulting comment titled “Which PC halfwit wrote the ‘criticism’ section?”:

Pamela Butler or Jigna Desai? Whichever one of you managed to get your narrow, tendentious p.o.v. (with something like 7 straight footnotes to the exact same source) turned into an entire section of this article should be very, very proud. Not. (“Talk: Chick lit”, 13 Jan. 2015a ).

I argue that the incomprehensible deletion of the criticism section represents an example of the often criticized racial bias in Wikipedia, which “stems in part from an under-representation of non-white people within its editor base” (Wikipedia: “Racial bias on Wikipedia”, 30 July 2020j ). While formally it is indeed not particularly elegant to add seven footnotes to a short paragraph that all lead to the same source, the information given was correct, state of the art chick lit research. The sensible approach in accordance with the “Wikiquette” (Wikipedia: “Etiquette”, 29 July 2020i ) would have been to constructively critique the new paragraph on the talk page, pointing out the formal weaknesses to the author, and then to jointly improve it.

While chicklit.co.uk never put a focus on women-of-color chick lit, chicklitbook.com from 2005 to 2012 had a subpage titled “Multicultural Chick Lit” about books “with heroines from all different nationalities and from different cultures” (25 Nov. 2005c ), divided into Indian Chick Lit , Latina Lit , Asian Chick Lit , and African-American Chick Lit . This page was under construction from July 2012 and did not go online anymore. For the fan websites, however, the deficit with regard to the diversity of the chick lit genre can be partly excused by the fact that they were not obliged to take a ‘neutral’ and balanced position in the first place. Moreover, they went offline in 2014/15 and were no longer regularly maintained and updated in the years before – a time when women-of-color chick lit had already existed for two decades, but was not yet widely discussed in research. This justification or excuse, however, no longer applies to the editors of the Wikipedia article on chick lit, because in recent years the diversity of the genre has been increasingly addressed and researched (see Hurt [ed.] 2019a ).

4 Conclusion and outlook

Based on the case study of chick lit, this article showed how web archives such as the Internet Archive and Wikipedia’s history page can be productive tools to research contemporary genre histories in the digital age. For chick lit, the claim that statements on fan websites are not relevant for the academic study of genres can be refuted. The definitions on both websites under examination, chicklit.co.uk and chicklitbooks.com , proved to be balanced; they were also regularly updated and adapted to new developments such as the emergence of new subgenres and the expansion of the genre’s definition. This speed and flexibility is a great advantage over academic publications. Regarding the evolution of the definition of chick lit, many researchers have noted an expansion and differentiation of the genre that had already been observed by chick lit fans and Wikipedia editors several years earlier. This is not surprising, considering the slow pace of academic publishing.

What may be surprising, however, is that online sources are still neither cited nor included in genre research, and thus, to a certain extent, written out of genre histories. This is all the more surprising as many of the online sources are available in different stages of their development that can be easily accessed through the Wayback Machine of the Internet Archive. Wikipedia’s history page even allows comparisons between almost all versions of their articles. Due to the collaborative nature of Wikipedia, not only the step-by-step evolution of the chick lit genre becomes transparent, but also disputes between authors and editors on the talk page. These discussions make it possible to draw additional conclusions from certain changes and deletions within an article. Although the comparative analysis of different versions of the chick lit article made it clear that the gender bias has become less severe over the years, the article does not seem to be exempt from the racial bias of Wikipedia, which, in the case of chick lit, also overlaps with a delay in academic research regarding women-of-color chick lit and global variants of the genre.

It could be very productive in the future if the relationship between academia, non-academic web sources and web archives was to be strengthened; and if not only academic material would find its way into digital formats and archives – as has been the case for many years in Wikipedia – but conversely also web content into research. This would not only enrich research – and the histories of contemporary genres is only one possible and very evident example of a whole range of fields of application in the Humanities – but also the digital formats and archives themselves. The more researchers participate, e.g. by writing and editing Wikipedia articles or by suggesting websites for filing in the Internet Archive, the better web archives can support research.

My translation. German original: “das Archiv erfüllt den Wunsch nach zuverlässiger materieller Konservierung und langfristiger Sicherung von Informationen, das Internet erfüllt den Wunsch nach Beschleunigung des Datenflusses und blitzschnellem und gezieltem Zugriff auf Information.”

The “almost” refers to the possibility of deleting versions. Revision deletion “is generally reserved for edits which: (1) present a legal liability to the host (e.g. copyright issues, defamation), or (2) present privacy threats to individuals (i.e. contact information).” (West & Lee,  2011 , 1).

Regarding the inclusion of the history page in literary research, see also Börner and Kopf ( 2018 , 216–219).

This does not mean that every new genre is equally likely to get a Wikipedia article. Wikipedia has notability guidelines for each of its language versions, which an article must meet before it is published. One of the most important guidelines is that “there must be verifiable, objective evidence that the subject has received significant attention from independent sources to support a claim of notability” (Wikipedia: “Notability”, 11 July 2020b ). Experience shows that in the case of new, contemporary genres like chick lit, these do not necessarily have to be secondary academic sources; a continuous, frequent discussion of a genre in newspapers and magazines can also prove its notability. Ultimately, the assessment of the notability of a topic depends strongly on who reviews the article before publication.

My translation. German original: “ganz banale Definitionsquellen […], die aktuelle Strömungen schnell und allgemein verständlich bestimmen” (Peitz, 2010 , 27–28), “bevor akademische Quellen wissenschaftlich darauf eingehen können” (ibid., 28/footnote 29).

In the early 2000s, web sources were usually not quoted at all, or, if they were, not completely and correctly, e.g. when Ferriss and Young ( 2006 , 1) quote from the American fan website, they only give its short URL (“ Chicklitbooks.com ”), which makes it very difficult to trace the reference back; especially since it was a relatively dynamic website which adapted its layout several times. For comparison: Peitz ( 2010 , 28) does not give a complete URL either, but at least the title of the subpage and the access date, e.g. “ ChickLitBooks.com . ‘What is Chick Lit?’ (21.01.2007)” or “Wikipedia (16.02.2006)”, which makes it easier to track her references.

The ‘death’ of the genre was increasingly postulated from 2011 onwards (cf. Coburn, 2012 ; Sherwin, 2011 ).

In Bushnell’s book, the story is mostly narrated by an anonymous third-person narrator and not by Carrie Bradshaw (as in the TV show); the repertoire of characters is large, going far beyond the four protagonists of the TV series. Fielding’s Bridget Jones’s Diary , on the other hand, is a first-person narrative, told through the diary entries of the title character and narrator Bridget.

They at least coined the use of ‘chick lit’ for a kind of contemporary literary genre. However, the term was already in use in the 1980s for Elaine Showalter’s course on the Female Literary Tradition at Princeton University (see Betterton, 1988 , 113).

Wikipedia describes its upward trend of quality as follows: “In a wiki, articles are never ‘finished’. They are continually edited and (usually) improved over time. In general this results in an upward trend of quality and a growing consensus over a fair and balanced representation of information.” (Wikipedia: “Researching with Wikipedia”, 21 April 2020a )

This commitment begins with the position of administrator: “privileged users who can delete pages, prevent articles from being changed in case of vandalism or editorial disputes (setting protective measures on articles), and try to prevent certain people from editing.” (Wikipedia: “Wikipedia”, 20 July 2020g )

The position of administrator is the lowest level of volunteer stewardship and includes some additional rights such as deleting pages or preventing articles from being changed (e.g. disputes, vandalism). For more information on administrators and other forms of volunteer stewardship see Wikipedia: “Wikipedia: Administration”, 21 Aug. 2020k .

My translation. German original: “Überhaupt überschreitet sie die Grenzen eines altertümlichen Bildungskanons und nimmt sich dem Zeitgeist, der Popkultur und den Subkulturen von Geeks, Nerds und allerlei Hobbyisten an.”

Hube et al. emphasize that Wikipedia “seems to convey a rather conservative, old-fashioned version of world literature, but a version derived from reproducible facts revealing an implicit literary canon based on the editing and reading behavior of millions of people” ( 2017 ). Wojcik and Picard supplement Hube et al.’s study with their observation that the canon is not only reproduced in Wikipedia, but also expanded. The page view statistics show that the range of authors tends to be more contemporary and also more diverse in terms of nationality and gender ( 2019 , 163–164).

The average Wikipedia editor is about 26 years old, male and from the United States, Germany, or Russia (Wikipedia: “Wikipedians”, 24 July  2020h ). There is broad agreement that there is a considerable gender bias in Wikipedia (Wikipedia: “Gender bias on Wikipedia”, 12 July  2020e ); a racial bias has also been criticized (Wikipedia: “Racial bias on Wikipedia”, 30 July 2020j ).

The Wikipedia article on “the neutral point of view” (NPOV) defines it as “representing fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, without editorial bias, all the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic.” (Wikipedia: “Neutral point of view”, 12 July 2020f )

It should be noted, however, that most authors have only made small contributions and changes. More than 50% of the text mass was written by two authors with the nicknames Mrthbtn11 (36.9%) and Madelynleighe13 (18.7%). (Wikipedia: "Chick lit, Authorship", 22 June 2020d )

Assmann, A. (2009). Archive im Wandel der Mediengeschichte. In K. Ebeling & S. Günzel (Eds.), Archivologie. Theorien des Archivs in Philosophie, Medien und Künsten (pp. 165–175). Kadmos.

Baldick, C. (2015a). Chick lit [2008]. In C. Baldick (Ed.), The Oxford dictionary of literary terms (pp. 57–58). 4 th ed. Oxford UP.

Baldick, C. (2015b) Lad lit [2008]. In C. Baldick (Ed.), The oxford dictionary of literary terms (p. 195). 4 th ed. Oxford UP.

Betterton, D. M. (1988). Alma mater: Unusual stories and little-known facts from America’s college campuses . Peterson’s Guides.

Börner, I., & Kopf, S. (2018). Wikipedia Studies: sprach- und literaturwissenschaftliche Zugänge zu Wikipedia . In I. Börner, W. Straub & C. Zolles (Eds.), Germanistik digital: Digital Humanities in der Sprach- und Literaturwissenschaft (pp. 212–227). Facultas.

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Folie, S. Recovering contemporary genre histories – the development of chick lit as seen through the internet archive’s wayback machine and wikipedia’s history page. Int J Digit Humanities 2 , 25–42 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42803-021-00031-6

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What do we mean by genre? This means a type of writing, i.e., an essay, a poem, a recipe, an email, a tweet. These are all different types (or categories) of writing, and each one has its own format, type of words, tone, and so on.  Analyzing a type of writing (or genre) is considered a genre analysis project. A genre analysis grants students the means to think critically about how a particular form of communication functions as well as a means to evaluate it.

Every genre (type of writing/writing style) has a set of conventions that allow that particular genre to be unique. These conventions include the following components:

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•   Expected Medium of Genre : where does the genre appear? Where is it created? i.e. can be it be online (digital) or does it need to be in print (computer paper, magazine, etc)? Where does this genre occur? i.e. flyers (mostly) occur in the hallways of our school, and letters of recommendation (mostly) occur in professors’ offices.
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To understand genre, one has to first understand the rhetorical situation of the communication. 

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Literary Genre

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This page addresses the research process -- the things that should be done before the actual writing of the paper -- and strategies for engaging in the process.  Although this LibGuide focuses on researching poems or poetry, this particular page is more general in scope and is applicable to most lower-division college research assignments.

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• the due dates of any intermediate assignments, like turning in a working bibliography or notes
• the length requirement (minimum word count), if any 
• the minimum number and types (for example, books or articles from scholarly, peer-reviewed journals) of sources required

These formal requirements are as much a part of the assignment as the paper itself.  They form the box into which you must fit your work.  Do not take them lightly.

When possible, it is helpful to subdivide the overall research process into phases, a tactic which

• makes the idea of research less intimidating because you are dealing with sections at a time rather than the whole process
• makes the process easier to manage
• gives a sense of accomplishment as you move from one phase to the next

Characteristics of a Well-written Paper

Although there are many details that must be given attention in writing a research paper, there are three major criteria which must be met.  A well-written paper is

• Unified:  the paper has only one major idea; or, if it seeks to address multiple points, one point is given priority and the others are subordinated to it.
• Coherent: the body of the paper presents its contents in a logical order easy for readers to follow; use of transitional phrases (in addition, because of this, therefore, etc.) between paragraphs and sentences is important.
• Complete:  the paper delivers on everything it promises and does not leave questions in the mind of the reader; everything mentioned in the introduction is discussed somewhere in the paper; the conclusion does not introduce new ideas or anything not already addressed in the paper.

Basic Research Strategy

• How to Research From Pellissippi State Community College Libraries: discusses the principal components of a simple search strategy.
• Basic Research Strategies From Nassau Community College: a start-up guide for college level research that supplements the information in the preceding link. Tabs two, three, and four plus the Web Evaluation tab are the most useful for JSU students. As with any LibGuide originating from another campus, care must be taken to recognize the information which is applicable generally from that which applies solely to the Guide's home campus. .
• Information Literacy Tutorial From Nassau Community College: an elaboration on the material covered in the preceding link (also from NCC) which discusses that material in greater depth. The quizzes and surveys may be ignored.

Things to Keep in Mind

Although a research assignment can be daunting, there are things which can make the process less stressful, more manageable, and yield a better result.  And they are generally applicable across all types and levels of research.

1.  Be aware of the parameters of the assignment: topic selection options, due date, length requirement, source requirements.  These form the box into which you must fit your work.  

2. Treat the assignment as a series of components or stages rather than one undivided whole.

• devise a schedule for each task in the process: topic selection and refinement (background/overview information), source material from books (JaxCat), source material from journals (databases/Discovery), other sources (internet, interviews, non-print materials); the note-taking, drafting, and editing processes.
• stick to your timetable.  Time can be on your side as a researcher, but only if you keep to your schedule and do not delay or put everything off until just before the assignment deadline. 

3.  Leave enough time between your final draft and the submission date of your work that you can do one final proofread after the paper is no longer "fresh" to you.  You may find passages that need additional work because you see that what is on the page and what you meant to write are quite different.  Even better, have a friend or classmate read your final draft before you submit it.  A fresh pair of eyes sometimes has clearer vision. 

4.  If at any point in the process you encounter difficulties, consult a librarian.  Hunters use guides; fishermen use guides.  Explorers use guides.  When you are doing research, you are an explorer in the realm of ideas; your librarian is your guide. 

A Note on Sources

Research requires engagement with various types of sources.

• Primary sources: the thing itself, such as letters, diaries, documents, a painting, a sculpture; in lower-division literary research, usually a play, poem, or short story.
• Secondary sources: information about the primary source, such as books, essays, journal articles, although images and other media also might be included.  Companions, dictionaries, and encyclopedias are secondary sources.
• Tertiary sources: things such as bibliographies, indexes, or electronic databases (minus the full text) which serve as guides to point researchers toward secondary sources.  A full text database would be a combination of a secondary and tertiary source; some books have a bibliography of additional sources in the back.

Accessing sources requires going through various "information portals," each designed to principally support a certain type of content.  Houston Cole Library provides four principal information portals:

• JaxCat online catalog: books, although other items such as journals, newspapers, DVDs, and musical scores also may be searched for.
• Electronic databases: journal articles, newspaper stories, interviews, reviews (and a few books; JaxCat still should be the "go-to" portal for books).  JaxCat indexes records for the complete item: the book, journal, newspaper, CD but has no records for parts of the complete item: the article in the journal, the editorial in the newspaper, the song off the CD.  Databases contain records for these things.
• Discovery Search: mostly journal articles, but also (some) books and (some) random internet pages.  Discovery combines elements of the other three information portals and is especially useful for searches where one is researching a new or obscure topic about which little is likely to be written, or does not know where the desired information may be concentrated.  Discovery is the only portal which permits simul-searching across databases provided by multiple vendors.
• Internet (Bing, Dogpile, DuckDuckGo, Google, etc.): primarily webpages, especially for businesses (.com), government divisions at all levels (.gov), or organizations (.org). as well as pages for primary source-type documents such as lesson plans and public-domain books.  While book content (Google Books) and journal articles (Google Scholar) are accessible, these are not the strengths of the internet and more successful searches for this type of content can be performed through JaxCat and the databases.  

NOTE: There is no predetermined hierarchy among these information portals as regards which one should be used most or gone to first.  These considerations depend on the task at hand and will vary from assignment o assignment.

The link below provides further information on the different source types.

• Research Methods From Truckee Meadows Community College: a guide to basic research. The tab "What Type of Source?" presents an overview of the various types of information sources, identifying the advantages and disadvantages of each.
• << Previous: Find Books
• Last Updated: Aug 29, 2024 1:03 PM
• URL: https://libguides.jsu.edu/litresearchpoems

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27 Literature Reviews

Literature reviews, what this handout is about.

This handout will explain what literature reviews are and offer insights into the form and construction of literature reviews in the humanities, social sciences, and sciences.

Introduction

OK. You’ve got to write a literature review. You dust off a novel and a book of poetry, settle down in your chair, and get ready to issue a “thumbs up” or “thumbs down” as you leaf through the pages. “Literature review” done. Right?

Wrong! The “literature” of a literature review refers to any collection of materials on a topic, not necessarily the great literary texts of the world. “Literature” could be anything from a set of government pamphlets on British colonial methods in Africa to scholarly articles on the treatment of a torn ACL. And a review does not necessarily mean that your reader wants you to give your personal opinion on whether or not you liked these sources.

What is a literature review, then?

A literature review discusses published information in a particular subject area, and sometimes information in a particular subject area within a certain time period.

A literature review can be just a simple summary of the sources, but it usually has an organizational pattern and combines both summary and synthesis. A summary is a recap of the important information of the source, but a synthesis is a re-organization, or a reshuffling, of that information. It might give a new interpretation of old material or combine new with old interpretations. Or it might trace the intellectual progression of the field, including major debates. And depending on the situation, the literature review may evaluate the sources and advise the reader on the most pertinent or relevant.

But how is a literature review different from an academic research paper?

The main focus of an academic research paper is to develop a new argument, and a research paper is likely to contain a literature review as one of its parts. In a research paper, you use the literature as a foundation and as support for a new insight that you contribute. The focus of a literature review, however, is to summarize and synthesize the arguments and ideas of others without adding new contributions.

Why do we write literature reviews?

Literature reviews provide you with a handy guide to a particular topic. If you have limited time to conduct research, literature reviews can give you an overview or act as a stepping stone. For professionals, they are useful reports that keep them up to date with what is current in the field. For scholars, the depth and breadth of the literature review emphasizes the credibility of the writer in his or her field. Literature reviews also provide a solid background for a research paper’s investigation. Comprehensive knowledge of the literature of the field is essential to most research papers.

Who writes these things, anyway?

Literature reviews are written occasionally in the humanities, but mostly in the sciences and social sciences; in experiment and lab reports, they constitute a section of the paper. Sometimes a literature review is written as a paper in itself.

Let’s get to it! What should I do before writing the literature review?

If your assignment is not very specific, seek clarification from your instructor:

• Roughly how many sources should you include?
• What types of sources (books, journal articles, websites)?
• Should you summarize, synthesize, or critique your sources by discussing a common theme or issue?
• Should you evaluate your sources?
• Should you provide subheadings and other background information, such as definitions and/or a history?

Find models

Look for other literature reviews in your area of interest or in the discipline and read them to get a sense of the types of themes you might want to look for in your own research or ways to organize your final review. You can simply put the word “review” in your search engine along with your other topic terms to find articles of this type on the Internet or in an electronic database. The bibliography or reference section of sources you’ve already read are also excellent entry points into your own research.

Narrow your topic

There are hundreds or even thousands of articles and books on most areas of study. The narrower your topic, the easier it will be to limit the number of sources you need to read in order to get a good survey of the material. Your instructor will probably not expect you to read everything that’s out there on the topic, but you’ll make your job easier if you first limit your scope.

Keep in mind that UNC Libraries have research guides and to databases relevant to many fields of study. You can reach out to the subject librarian for a consultation:  https://library.unc.edu/support/consultations/ .

And don’t forget to tap into your professor’s (or other professors’) knowledge in the field. Ask your professor questions such as: “If you had to read only one book from the 90’s on topic X, what would it be?” Questions such as this help you to find and determine quickly the most seminal pieces in the field.

Consider whether your sources are current

Some disciplines require that you use information that is as current as possible. In the sciences, for instance, treatments for medical problems are constantly changing according to the latest studies. Information even two years old could be obsolete. However, if you are writing a review in the humanities, history, or social sciences, a survey of the history of the literature may be what is needed, because what is important is how perspectives have changed through the years or within a certain time period. Try sorting through some other current bibliographies or literature reviews in the field to get a sense of what your discipline expects. You can also use this method to consider what is currently of interest to scholars in this field and what is not.

Strategies for writing the literature review

Find a focus.

A literature review, like a term paper, is usually organized around ideas, not the sources themselves as an annotated bibliography would be organized. This means that you will not just simply list your sources and go into detail about each one of them, one at a time. No. As you read widely but selectively in your topic area, consider instead what themes or issues connect your sources together. Do they present one or different solutions? Is there an aspect of the field that is missing? How well do they present the material and do they portray it according to an appropriate theory? Do they reveal a trend in the field? A raging debate? Pick one of these themes to focus the organization of your review.

Convey it to your reader

A literature review may not have a traditional thesis statement (one that makes an argument), but you do need to tell readers what to expect. Try writing a simple statement that lets the reader know what is your main organizing principle. Here are a couple of examples:

The current trend in treatment for congestive heart failure combines surgery and medicine. More and more cultural studies scholars are accepting popular media as a subject worthy of academic consideration.

Consider organization

You’ve got a focus, and you’ve stated it clearly and directly. Now what is the most effective way of presenting the information? What are the most important topics, subtopics, etc., that your review needs to include? And in what order should you present them? Develop an organization for your review at both a global and local level:

First, cover the basic categories

Just like most academic papers, literature reviews also must contain at least three basic elements: an introduction or background information section; the body of the review containing the discussion of sources; and, finally, a conclusion and/or recommendations section to end the paper.  The following provides a brief description of the content of each:

• Introduction:  Gives a quick idea of the topic of the literature review, such as the central theme or organizational pattern.
• Body:  Contains your discussion of sources and is organized either chronologically, thematically, or methodologically (see below for more information on each).
• Conclusions/Recommendations:  Discuss what you have drawn from reviewing literature so far. Where might the discussion proceed?

Organizing the body

Once you have the basic categories in place, then you must consider how you will present the sources themselves within the body of your paper. Create an organizational method to focus this section even further.

To help you come up with an overall organizational framework for your review, consider the following scenario:

You’ve decided to focus your literature review on materials dealing with sperm whales. This is because you’ve just finished reading Moby Dick, and you wonder if that whale’s portrayal is really real. You start with some articles about the physiology of sperm whales in biology journals written in the 1980’s. But these articles refer to some British biological studies performed on whales in the early 18th century. So you check those out. Then you look up a book written in 1968 with information on how sperm whales have been portrayed in other forms of art, such as in Alaskan poetry, in French painting, or on whale bone, as the whale hunters in the late 19th century used to do. This makes you wonder about American whaling methods during the time portrayed in Moby Dick, so you find some academic articles published in the last five years on how accurately Herman Melville portrayed the whaling scene in his novel.

Now consider some typical ways of organizing the sources into a review:

• Chronological:  If your review follows the chronological method, you could write about the materials above according to when they were published. For instance, first you would talk about the British biological studies of the 18th century, then about Moby Dick, published in 1851, then the book on sperm whales in other art (1968), and finally the biology articles (1980s) and the recent articles on American whaling of the 19th century. But there is relatively no continuity among subjects here. And notice that even though the sources on sperm whales in other art and on American whaling are written recently, they are about other subjects/objects that were created much earlier. Thus, the review loses its chronological focus.
• By publication:  Order your sources by publication chronology, then, only if the order demonstrates a more important trend. For instance, you could order a review of literature on biological studies of sperm whales if the progression revealed a change in dissection practices of the researchers who wrote and/or conducted the studies.
• By trend:  A better way to organize the above sources chronologically is to examine the sources under another trend, such as the history of whaling. Then your review would have subsections according to eras within this period. For instance, the review might examine whaling from pre-1600-1699, 1700-1799, and 1800-1899. Under this method, you would combine the recent studies on American whaling in the 19th century with Moby Dick itself in the 1800-1899 category, even though the authors wrote a century apart.
• Thematic:  Thematic reviews of literature are organized around a topic or issue, rather than the progression of time. However, progression of time may still be an important factor in a thematic review. For instance, the sperm whale review could focus on the development of the harpoon for whale hunting. While the study focuses on one topic, harpoon technology, it will still be organized chronologically. The only difference here between a “chronological” and a “thematic” approach is what is emphasized the most: the development of the harpoon or the harpoon technology.But more authentic thematic reviews tend to break away from chronological order. For instance, a thematic review of material on sperm whales might examine how they are portrayed as “evil” in cultural documents. The subsections might include how they are personified, how their proportions are exaggerated, and their behaviors misunderstood. A review organized in this manner would shift between time periods within each section according to the point made.
• Methodological:  A methodological approach differs from the two above in that the focusing factor usually does not have to do with the content of the material. Instead, it focuses on the “methods” of the researcher or writer. For the sperm whale project, one methodological approach would be to look at cultural differences between the portrayal of whales in American, British, and French art work. Or the review might focus on the economic impact of whaling on a community. A methodological scope will influence either the types of documents in the review or the way in which these documents are discussed. Once you’ve decided on the organizational method for the body of the review, the sections you need to include in the paper should be easy to figure out. They should arise out of your organizational strategy. In other words, a chronological review would have subsections for each vital time period. A thematic review would have subtopics based upon factors that relate to the theme or issue.

Sometimes, though, you might need to add additional sections that are necessary for your study, but do not fit in the organizational strategy of the body. What other sections you include in the body is up to you. Put in only what is necessary.  Here are a few other sections you might want to consider:

• Current Situation:  Information necessary to understand the topic or focus of the literature review.
• History:  The chronological progression of the field, the literature, or an idea that is necessary to understand the literature review, if the body of the literature review is not already a chronology.
• Methods and/or Standards:  The criteria you used to select the sources in your literature review or the way in which you present your information. For instance, you might explain that your review includes only peer-reviewed articles and journals.

Questions for Further Research: What questions about the field has the review sparked? How will you further your research as a result of the review?

Begin composing

Once you’ve settled on a general pattern of organization, you’re ready to write each section. There are a few guidelines you should follow during the writing stage as well. Here is a sample paragraph from a literature review about sexism and language to illuminate the following discussion:

However, other studies have shown that even gender-neutral antecedents are more likely to produce masculine images than feminine ones (Gastil, 1990). Hamilton (1988) asked students to complete sentences that required them to fill in pronouns that agreed with gender-neutral antecedents such as “writer,” “pedestrian,” and “persons.” The students were asked to describe any image they had when writing the sentence. Hamilton found that people imagined 3.3 men to each woman in the masculine “generic” condition and 1.5 men per woman in the unbiased condition. Thus, while ambient sexism accounted for some of the masculine bias, sexist language amplified the effect. (Source: Erika Falk and Jordan Mills, “Why Sexist Language Affects Persuasion: The Role of Homophily, Intended Audience, and Offense,” Women and Language19:2).

Use evidence

In the example above, the writers refer to several other sources when making their point. A literature review in this sense is just like any other academic research paper. Your interpretation of the available sources must be backed up with evidence to show that what you are saying is valid.

Be selective

Select only the most important points in each source to highlight in the review. The type of information you choose to mention should relate directly to the review’s focus, whether it is thematic, methodological, or chronological.

Use quotes sparingly

Falk and Mills do not use any direct quotes. That is because the survey nature of the literature review does not allow for in-depth discussion or detailed quotes from the text. Some short quotes here and there are okay, though, if you want to emphasize a point, or if what the author said just cannot be rewritten in your own words. Notice that Falk and Mills do quote certain terms that were coined by the author, not common knowledge, or taken directly from the study. But if you find yourself wanting to put in more quotes, check with your instructor.

Summarize and synthesize

Remember to summarize and synthesize your sources within each paragraph as well as throughout the review. The authors here recapitulate important features of Hamilton’s study, but then synthesize it by rephrasing the study’s significance and relating it to their own work.

Keep your own voice

While the literature review presents others’ ideas, your voice (the writer’s) should remain front and center. Notice that Falk and Mills weave references to other sources into their own text, but they still maintain their own voice by starting and ending the paragraph with their own ideas and their own words. The sources support what Falk and Mills are saying.

Use caution when paraphrasing

When paraphrasing a source that is not your own, be sure to represent the author’s information or opinions accurately and in your own words. In the preceding example, Falk and Mills either directly refer in the text to the author of their source, such as Hamilton, or they provide ample notation in the text when the ideas they are mentioning are not their own, for example, Gastil’s. For more information, please see our  handout on plagiarism .

Revise, revise, revise

Draft in hand? Now you’re ready to revise. Spending a lot of time revising is a wise idea, because your main objective is to present the material, not the argument. So check over your review again to make sure it follows the assignment and/or your outline. Then, just as you would for most other academic forms of writing, rewrite or rework the language of your review so that you’ve presented your information in the most concise manner possible. Be sure to use terminology familiar to your audience; get rid of unnecessary jargon or slang. Finally, double check that you’ve documented your sources and formatted the review appropriately for your discipline. For tips on the revising and editing process, see our  handout on revising drafts .

Works consulted

We consulted these works while writing this handout. This is not a comprehensive list of resources on the handout’s topic, and we encourage you to do your own research to find additional publications. Please do not use this list as a model for the format of your own reference list, as it may not match the citation style you are using. For guidance on formatting citations, please see the  UNC Libraries citation tutorial . We revise these tips periodically and welcome feedback.

Anson, Chris M., and Robert A. Schwegler. 2010.  The Longman Handbook for Writers and Readers , 6th ed. New York: Longman.

Jones, Robert, Patrick Bizzaro, and Cynthia Selfe. 1997.  The Harcourt Brace Guide to Writing in the Disciplines . New York: Harcourt Brace.

Lamb, Sandra E. 1998.  How to Write It: A Complete Guide to Everything You’ll Ever Write . Berkeley: Ten Speed Press.

Rosen, Leonard J., and Laurence Behrens. 2003.  The Allyn & Bacon Handbook , 5th ed. New York: Longman.

Troyka, Lynn Quittman, and Doug Hesse. 2016.  Simon and Schuster Handbook for Writers , 11th ed. London: Pearson.

LICESNSES AND ATTRIBUTIONS

• Literature Reviews. By: The Writing Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Located at: https://writingcenter.unc.edu/tips-and-tools/literature-reviews/ Licenses: CC-BY-NC-ND

Writing in Genres Copyright © 2023 by Stephanie Frame is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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Writing in Literature

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In this section

Subsections.

18.3 Glance at Genre: Genre, Audience, Purpose, Organization

Learning outcomes.

By the end of this section, you will be able to:

• Identify key genre conventions, including structure, tone, and mechanics.
• Implement common formats and design features for different text types.
• Demonstrate how genre conventions vary and are shaped by purpose, culture, and expectation.

The multimodal genres of writing are based on the idea that modes work in different ways, with different outcomes, to create various vehicles for communication. By layering, or combining, modes, an author can make meaning and communicate through mixed modes what a single mode cannot on its own. Essentially, modes “cooperate” to communicate the author’s intent as they interweave meanings captured by each.

For example, think of a public service announcement about environmental conservation. A composer can create a linguistic text about the dangers of plastic pollution in oceans and support the ideas with knowledge of or expertise in the subject. Yet words alone may not communicate the message forcefully, particularly if the audience consists of people who have never considered the impact of pollution on the oceans. That composer, then, might combine the text with images of massive amounts of human-generated plastic waste littering a shoreline, thus strengthening the argument and enhancing meaning by touching on audience emotions. By using images to convey some of the message, the composer layers modes. The picture alone does not tell the whole story, but when combined with informational text, it enhances the viewer’s understanding of the issue. Modes, therefore, can be combined in various ways to communicate a rhetorical idea effectively.

Audience Awareness

As with any type of composition, knowing your audience (the readers and viewers for whom you are creating) will help you determine what information to include and what genre, mode(s), or media in which to present it. Consider your audience when choosing a composition’s tone (composer’s attitude toward the audience or subject), substance, and language. Considering the audience is critical not only in traditional academic writing but also in nearly any genre or mode you choose. Ask yourself these questions when analyzing your audience’s awareness:

• What (and how much) does the audience already know about the topic? The amount of background information needed can influence what genre, modes, and media types you include and how you use them. You don’t want to bore an audience with information that is common knowledge or overwhelm an audience with information they know nothing about.
• What is the audience’s viewpoint on the subject? Are you creating for a skeptical audience or one that largely agrees with your rhetorical arguments?
• How do you relate to your audience? Do you share cultural understanding, or are you presenting information or beliefs that will be unfamiliar? This information will help you shape the message, tone, and structure of the composition.

Understanding your audience allows you to choose rhetorical devices that reflect ethos (appeals to ethics: credibility), logos (appeals to logic: reason), and pathos (appeals to sympathy: emotion) to create contextually responsive compositions through multiple modes.

It important to address audience diversity in all types of composition, but the unique aspects of multimodal composition present particular opportunities and challenges. First, when you compose, you do so through your own cultural filter, formed from your experiences, gender, education, and other factors. Multimodal composition opens up the ability to develop your cultural filter through various methods. Think about images of your lived experiences, videos capturing cultural events, or even gestures in live performances. Also consider the diversity of your audience members and how that affects the content choices you make during composition. Avoiding ethnocentrism —the assumption that the customs, values, and beliefs of your culture are superior to others—is an important consideration when addressing your audience, as is using bias-free language, especially regarding ethnicity, gender, and abilities.

Blogs, Vlogs, and Creative Compositions

Among the modes available to you as a composer, blogs (regularly updated websites, usually run by an individual or a small group) have emerged as a significant genre in digital literature. The term blog , a combination of web and log , was coined in 1999 and gained rapid popularity in the early 2000s. In general, blogs have a relatively narrow focus on a topic or argument and present a distinctive structure that includes these features:

• A headline or title draws in potential readers. Headlines are meant to grab attention, be short, and accurately reflect the content of the blog post.
• An introduction hooks the reader, briefly introducing the topic and establishing the author’s credibility on the subject.
• Short paragraphs often are broken up by images, videos, or other media to make meaning and supplement or support the text content.
• The narrative is often composed in a style in which the author claims or demonstrates expertise.
• Media such as images, video, and infographics depict information graphically and break up text.
• Hyperlinks (links to other internet locations) to related content often serve as evidence supporting the author’s claim.
• A call to action provides clear and actionable instructions that engage the reader.

Blogs offer accessibility and an opportunity to make meaning in new ways. By integrating images and audiovisual media, you can develop a multimodal representation of arguments and ideas. Blogs also provide an outlet for conveying ideas through both personal and formal narratives and are used frequently in industries from entertainment to scientific research to government organizations.

Newer in the family of multimodal composition is the video blog, or vlog , a blog for which the medium is video. Vlogs usually combine video embedded in a website with supporting text, images, or other modes of communication. Vlogging often takes on a narrative structure, similar to other types of storytelling, with the added element of supplementary audio and video, including digital transitions that connect one idea or scene to another. Vlogs offer ample opportunities to mix modalities.

Vlogs give a literal voice to a composer, who typically narrates or speaks directly to the camera. Like a blogger, a vlog creator acts as an expert, telling a narrative story or using rhetoric to argue a point. Vlogs often strive to create an authentic and informal tone, similar to published blogs, inviting a stream-of-consciousness or interview-like style. Therefore, they often work well when targeted toward audiences for whom a casual mood is valuable and easily understood.

Other creative compositions include websites, digital or print newsletters, podcasts, and a wide variety of other content. Each composition type has its own best practices regarding structure and organization, often depending on the chosen modalities, the way they are used, and the intended audience. Whatever the mode, however, all multimodal writing has several characteristics in common, beginning with effective, intentional composition.

Effective Writing

Experimenting with modes and media is not an excuse for poorly developed writing that lacks focus, organization, thought, purpose, or attention to mechanics. Although multimodal compositions offer flexibility of expression, the content still must be presented in well-crafted, organized, and purposeful ways that reflect the author’s purpose and the audience’s needs.

• To be well-crafted, a composition should reflect the author’s use of literary devices to convey meaning, use of relevant connections, and acknowledgment of grammar and writing conventions.
• To be organized, a composition should reflect the author’s use of effective transitions and a logical structure appropriate to the chosen mode.
• To be purposeful, a composition should show that the author addresses the needs of the audience, uses rhetorical devices that advance the argument, and offers insightful understanding of the topic.

Organization of multimodal compositions refers to the sequence of message elements. You must decide which ideas require attention, how much and in what order, and which modalities create maximum impact on readers. While many types of formal and academic writing follow a prescribed format, or at least the general outline of one, the exciting and sometimes overwhelming features of multimodal possibilities open the door to any number of acceptable formats. Some of these are prescribed, and others more open ended; your job will inevitably be to determine when to follow a template and when to create something new. As the composer, you seek to structure media in ways that will enable the reader, or audience, to derive meaning. Even small changes in media, rhetorical appeal, and organization can alter the ways in which the audience participates in the construction of meaning.

Within a medium—for example, a video—you might include images, audio, and text. By shifting the organization, placement, and interaction among the modes, you change the structure of the video and therefore create varieties of meaning. Now, imagine you use that same structure of images, audio, and text, but change the medium to a slideshow. The impact on the audience will likely change with the change in medium. Consider the infamous opening scene of the horror movie The Shining (1980). The primary medium, video, shows a car driving through a mountainous region. After audio is added, however, the meaning of the multimodal composition changes, creating an emphasis on pace—management of dead air—and tone—attitude toward the subject—that communicates something new to the audience.

Exploring the Genre

These are the key terms and characteristics of multimodal texts.

• Alignment: the way in which elements such as text features, images, and particularly text are placed on a page. Text can be aligned at the left, center, or right. Alignment contributes to organization and how media transitions within a text.
• Audience: readers or viewers of the composition.
• Channel: a medium used to communicate a message. Often-used channels include websites, blogs, social media, print, audio, and video-hosting sites.
• Complementary: describes content that is different across two or more modes, both of which are necessary for understanding. Often audio and visual modes are complementary, with one making the other more meaningful.
• Emphasis: the elements in media that are most significant or pronounced. The emphasis choices have a major impact on the overall meaning of the text.
• Focus: a clear purpose for composition, also called the central idea, main point, or guiding principle. Focus should include the specific audience the composer is trying to influence.
• Layering: combining modes in a single composition.
• Layout: the organization of elements on a page, including text, images, shapes, and overall composition. Layout applies primarily to the visual mode.
• Media: the means and channels of reaching an audience (for example, image, website, song). A medium (singular form of media ) can contain multiple modes.
• Mode: the method of communication (linguistic, visual, audio, or spatial means of creating meaning). Media can incorporate more than one mode.
• Organization: the pattern of arrangement that allows a reader to understand text or images in a composition. Organization may be textual, visual, or spatial.
• Proximity: the relationship between objects in space, specifically how close to or far from one another they are. Proximity can show a relationship between elements and is often important in layout.
• Purpose: an author’s reason for writing a text, including the reasoning that accounts for which modes of presentation to use. Composers of multimodal texts may seek to persuade, inform, or entertain the audience.
• Repetition: a unifying feature, such as a pattern used more than once, in the way in which elements (text features, typeface, color, etc.) are used on a page. Repetition often indicates emphasis or a particular theme. Repetitions and patterns can help focus a composition, explore a theme, and emphasize important points.
• Supplementary: describes content that is different in two or more modes, where a composer uses one mode to convey primary understanding and the other(s) to support or extend understanding. Supplementary content should not be thought of as “extra,” for its purpose is to expand on the primary media.
• Text: written words. In multimodal composition, text can refer to a piece of communication as a whole, incorporating written words, images, sounds, and movement.
• Tone: the composer’s attitude toward the subject and/or the audience.
• Transitions: words, phrases, or audiovisual elements that help readers make connections between ideas in a multimodal text, including connections from sentence to sentence, paragraph to paragraph, and mode to mode. Transitions show relationships between ideas and help effectively organize a composition.

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• Authors: Michelle Bachelor Robinson, Maria Jerskey, featuring Toby Fulwiler
• Publisher/website: OpenStax
• Book title: Writing Guide with Handbook
• Publication date: Dec 21, 2021
• Location: Houston, Texas
• Book URL: https://openstax.org/books/writing-guide/pages/1-unit-introduction
• Section URL: https://openstax.org/books/writing-guide/pages/18-3-glance-at-genre-genre-audience-purpose-organization

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