Design Research Methodology / Critical Review

28/4/2022 - 19/5/2022 / Week 5 - Week 7
Nurul Adlina Rizal / 0345429 / Bachelor of Design in Creative Media
Design Research Methodology
Critical Review

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LECTURES

Week 5: 

What is a Critical Review

- an analysis and evaluation of a book, article, or other medium
- requires that you understand the material and know how to analyse and evaluate that material 
- a journal article evaluates the strengths and weaknesses of an article's ideas and content 
- provides description, analysis and interpretation that allows readers to assess the article's value 

Before You Read the Article

- what does the title lead you to expect about the article
- study any sub-headings to understand how to author organised the content 
- the abstract for a summary to determine what research contributed to the author's arguments 

Reading the Article: Points to Consider

- intended audience?
- survey and summarize
- author define important terms?

Prepare an Outline

- choose a statement that expresses the central purpose 
- consider the author's intentions and whether or not you think those intentions were successfully realized
- organise your remaining points
- devise a logical sequence for presenting these ideas
- all ideas must support your central write up/literature

Write the First Draft

first paragraph

- a statement of your write-up/literature 
- the author's purpose in writing the article
- comments on how the article relates to other work on the same subject
- information about the author's reputation or authority in the field 

body of the review

- state your arguments in support of your write-up/literature
- follow the logical development of ideas that you mapped out in your outline
- include quotations from the article which illustrate your main ideas

concluding paragraph

- summarize your review
- restate your write-up/literature

Revise the First Draft

- should leave your first draft for a day or two before revising
- allows you to gain a more objective perspective on your ideas

check the:

- grammar and punctuation errors
- organization, logical development and solid support of your write-up/literature
- errors in quotations or in references

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INSTRUCTIONS

Critical Review

Week 5 (28/4/2022)

Briefing of the Critical Review task. Dr Hayati checked on my progress on the critical review of each article. 

Google Drive Link: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1cvlyA8iUQQM0pWINCI14QLxaPYBZ5BYQ

The First Draft

Fig 1.0: Draft #1 (20/5/2022)

In the first draft, I only made critical reviews of each article I was reading on that was related to my topic. I had more than 5 so I had to properly choose which content would be best for my research. 

As Dr Hayati said, having a book as a reference was difficult for me and after briefly reading through it, I realised it would not be very helpful for my research so I had decided not to choose the book (about Simpsons) as a reference. 

Week 7 (12/4/2022)

FINAL

Fig 1.1: Critical Review Final (20/5/2022)

In my final, I included the introduction, summary, critical review of each article and a conclusion. 

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FEEDBACKS

Week 5

General Feedback: Dr Hayati advised us to use Mendeley to help us refer to our notes when drafting our Critical Review. 

Specific Feedback: Dr Hayati told me to revise some parts of my research questions to better fit the research objective. 

Week 6

General Feedback: -

Specific Feedback: -

Week 7

General Feedback: -

Specific Feedback: Dr. Hayati told me that books could be a hassle to use as a reference and to make sure that each article chosen will help support my research. 

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REFLECTIONS

Experience

During class, Dr. Hayati gave useful and great feedbacks that helped me to better understand the task. I was also able to get specific feedbacks so that I can understand my research topic better and the direction I should be heading towards. Being able to hear the feedback of my fellow Digital Animation classmates was good too because I was able to see the topics that interested them in the animation field. 

Observation

I observed that it was very difficult to find articles that directly mention the topic that I was working on. There was not much research on my topic despite having countless articles on something almost similar. I also wanted to use My Little Pony as my case study due to it being targeted for the young audience for how entertaining it yet mature enough for older audiences. I believe its a good example for how good storytelling can transcend any age and still teach them a good lesson at the end. However, there were not many articles on My Little Pony's storytelling. There was just many of the fandom itself and how the fans are of all ages and gender. 

Findings

From this task, I learned that I should look at articles critically and make proper judgement so I can distinguish articles that would fit my topic and research best.