4 Steps in Writing Literature Review
4 Steps in Writing Literature Review
4 Steps in Writing Literature Review
It requires a
comprehensive understanding of the topic, critical analysis of existing literature, and effective
synthesis of ideas. Here are four essential steps to guide you through the process of crafting a
literature review:
1. Identify the Scope and Purpose: Before delving into the literature, clearly define the scope
and purpose of your review. Determine the specific research question or topic you want to
explore and understand the relevance of your review within the broader academic context.
2. Conduct Comprehensive Research: Conduct thorough research to identify relevant
scholarly sources, including books, journal articles, conference proceedings, and other
reputable publications. Utilize academic databases, libraries, and online resources to gather a
diverse range of perspectives and insights related to your topic.
3. Analyze and Synthesize: Once you have gathered a sufficient amount of literature, critically
analyze each source to evaluate its credibility, methodology, findings, and theoretical
frameworks. Identify key themes, trends, and debates within the literature and consider how
different authors contribute to the overall understanding of your topic.
4. Organize and Structure: Organize your literature review in a logical and coherent manner.
Consider different approaches, such as chronological, thematic, or theoretical frameworks, to
structure your review effectively. Provide clear transitions between different sections and
ensure that your review flows seamlessly from one idea to the next.
Writing a literature review requires time, patience, and attention to detail. It involves synthesizing
complex ideas and presenting them in a clear and concise manner. If you find yourself struggling with
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If the literature review is part of your dissertation or thesis, reiterate how your research addresses
gaps and contributes new knowledge, or discuss how you have drawn on existing theories and
methods to build a framework for your research. Literature review outlooks the existing sources on a
given topic. GIFs Highlight your latest work via email or social media with custom GIFs. Writing
literature reviews is a particularly important skill if you want to apply for graduate school or pursue a
career in research. Application of Deductive and Inductive Logic: If your study is quantitative, you
apply deductive logic to it. Correct my document today Writing literature reviews can be quite
challenging. State how you will actually do the methods (i.e. coding interview text, running
regression analysis, etc.). Anticipate and acknowledge any potential barriers you may encounter
when undertaking your research and describe how you will address these barriers. To ensure the
completeness of your review, we advise that you combine the three strategies and utilize more than
one digital library. Promotes Theory Development: Evaluates and combines existing theories, possibly
leading to new ones. It can also help you to avoid duplicating work that has already been done by
other researchers. If you have found some recurring central themes, you can organise your literature
review into subsections that address different aspects of the topic. In this case, you should dig
around the thesis topic, enquiry objectives, and purpose. You can argue for the relevance of a
specific theoretical approach or combine various theorical concepts to create a framework for your
research. Theoretical Review The purpose of this form is to examine the corpus of theory that has
accumulated in regard to an issue, concept, theory, phenomena. All of our appointments are free of
charge and confidential. If your paper does not depend entirely on references, then it will be short.
State-of-the-Art Review The State-of-the-Art review is conducted periodically, focusing on the most
recent research. Should I summarize, synthesize, or critique sources by discussing a common theme
or issue? 4. Literature review is a mandatory part of any research project. Use the bibliographies and
references of research studies you find to locate others. Importantly, narrative reviews can also be
used as educational articles to bring practitioners up to date with certain topics of issues ( Green et
al., 2006 ). Recently, there have been several efforts to introduce more rigour in narrative reviews that
will elucidate common pitfalls and bring changes into their publication standards. Issuu turns PDFs
and other files into interactive flipbooks and engaging content for every channel. Depending on the
length of your literature review, you might want to divide the body into subsections. One method is
to interpret how or why specific developments occurred. By assessing the available sources in your
field of research, you will be able to make a more confident argument about the topic. To identify the
most important publications on your topic, take note of recurring citations. Haroon interviewed 115
residents from 32 different nursing homes known to have different levels of autonomy (2000). And
depending on the situation, the literature review may evaluate the sources and advise the reader on
the most pertinent or relevant. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our terms and conditions of
fair use. What’s important to understand is that the research gap (or gaps) needs to emerge from your
previous discussion of the theoretical and empirical literature.
You will need to visit your school’s library, either in person or virtually, to research material about
your topic. Its purpose is to identify and gather the meridian insights, gaps, and answers to research
questions. A Step-by-Step Guide to Writing Literature Review In this step, you will screen and select
resources closely related to your research question. The literature review gives you a chance to:
Demonstrate your familiarity with the topic and scholarly context Develop a theoretical framework
and methodology for your research Position yourself in relation to other researchers and theorists
Show how your dissertation addresses a gap or contributes to a debate You might also have to write
a literature review as a stand-alone assignment. For example: Look at what results have emerged in
qualitative versus quantitative research Discuss how the topic has been approached by empirical
versus theoretical scholarship Divide the literature into sociological, historical, and cultural sources
Theoretical A literature review is often the foundation for a theoretical framework. Write the review
Thompson Writing Studio This link opens in a new window Need to write a systematic review.
Acknowledging Limitations: It helps you in acknowledging the limitations of your study and
shaping it accordingly. Where to find databases: use the tabs on this guide Find other databases in
the Nursing Information Resources web page More on the Medical Library web page. But before
you go, Six Online Tools for Easy Literature Review Evaluating literature review: systematic vs.
However, bias could also occur in the other direction: some scientists may be unduly dismissive of
their own achievements, so that they will tend to downplay their contribution (if any) to a field when
reviewing it. Since the purpose of a literature review is to demonstrate that the writer is familiar with
the important professional literature on the chosen subject, check to make certain that you have
covered all of the important, up-to-date, and pertinent texts. A literature review allows you to
highlight essential ideas and methodologies while also highlighting gaps in whatever research
currently exists because it provides an overview of existing research. Is it manageable? Begin writing
down terms that are related to your question. Connection: Not establishing a very clear connection
between the literature and your research even though it is extremely critical. Here are some
examples: Chronological: The simplest approach is to trace the development of the topic over time,
which helps familiarize the audience with the topic (for instance if you are introducing something
that is not commonly known in your field). Magazines, on the other hand, are often only beneficial as
a starting point for your study because they contain news or broad information about discoveries,
policies, and other topics that may then be further studied in more specialized sources. While
conducting a review of the literature, maximize the time you devote to writing this part of your paper
by thinking broadly about what you should be looking for and evaluating. For each source, consider
the following: What's the Author Trying to Do. Adobe Express Go from Adobe Express creation to
Issuu publication. Give your interpretation of how and why certain developments occurred (as
mentioned previously, this may not be appropriate in your discipline — check with a teacher or
mentor if you’re unsure). Example: When reviewing research on the efficacy of a medical treatment,
sections might be organized based on experimental methods, observational studies, and clinical trials.
Feedback is vital to writing a good review, and should be sought from a variety of colleagues, so as
to obtain a diversity of views on the draft. It is done when using an inductive research approach.
Keep your own voice While the literature review presents others’ ideas, your voice (the writer’s)
should remain front and center. When writing a literature review, be sure to use your own words and
cite all of your sources properly to avoid plagiarism How to get started with writing a literature
review. Conclusion: Summarize the key findings you have taken from the literature and emphasize
their significance Connect it back to your primary research question How should I organize my lit
review. To this end, they conducted a comprehensive search on multiple databases using highly
sensitive search strategies without language or publication-type restrictions to identify all rct s that
are eligible for inclusion. The sources support what Falk and Mills are saying. In other words, your
discussion in those sections needs to start laying the foundation for the research gap. This is mind
blowing, the detailed explanation and simplicity is perfect.
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. As
described in Chapter 5, the literature review provides the background to your study and
demonstrates the significance of the proposed research. Common complaint; could’t find anything in
the literature that is related to their studies can’t find exactly the same topic. You should also
emphasize the significance of these findings in your conclusion. Specifically, it is a review and
synthesis of prior research that is related to the problem you are setting forth to investigate. You lot
should just empathize its basic rules, and that's it. If you have found some recurring central themes,
you can organise your literature review into subsections that address different aspects of the topic.
You may republish or adapt this guide for educational purposes, as long as proper credit is given.
Findings from eight rct s involving 6,615 participants were pooled into meta-analyses to calculate the
magnitude of effects that mobile text message reminders have on the rate of attendance at healthcare
appointments compared to no reminders and phone call reminders. Uncover connections and
relationships among diverse research pieces to construct a cohesive narrative within your literature
review. Those can be dissertations, theses, or research papers. As another methodological
contribution, vom Brocke et al. (2009) offered a series of guidelines for conducting literature
reviews, with a particular focus on how to search and extract the relevant body of knowledge.
Writing a Literature Review The basic components of a literature review include: a description of
the publication; a summary of the publication's main points; a discussion of gaps in research.
Evaluation: Needless to say, a critique of the theories chosen by you for study must form the bigger
part of your literature review. Rule 6: Be Critical and Consistent Reviewing the literature is not
stamp collecting. In addressing these points, you argue for your place in the conversation, which
tends to make the lit review more compelling than a simple reporting of other sources. This is
because literature reviews require you to search for and critically evaluate existing research.
Moreover, you can sort the results based on the publishing date, citation count, and relevance. This
saves time when you want to redo, or modify, the searches. Many systematic reviews, but not all,
use statistical methods to combine the results of independent studies into a single quantitative
estimate or summary effect size. If you have used sources from different disciplines that use a
variety of research methods, you might want to compare the results in light of the different methods
and discuss how the topic has been approached from different sides. If you are dedicated to finding
literature, it will take you less than three sessions. Analyze its literature review, the samples and
variables used, the results, and the conclusions. SciSpace Discover helps you assess the quality of a
source by providing an overview of its references, citations, and performance metrics. Thematic
review: A thematic review of literature is organized around a topic or issue, rather than the
progression of time. How does the publication contribute to your understanding of the topic. How is
the topic of your research proposal related to the problem. In other words, you do not want to delve
into idle speculation. To circumvent these limitations, Pawson, Greenhalgh, Harvey, and Walshe
(2005) have proposed a new approach for synthesizing knowledge that seeks to unpack the
mechanism of how “complex interventions” work in particular contexts. Also, ensure that you are
using the correct format for referencing according to the professor’s instructions or your discipline.
A good strategy is to begin by searching the USC Libraries Catalog for recent books about the topic
and review the table of contents for chapters that focuses on specific issues. Most lit reviews use a
basic introduction-body-conclusion structure; if your lit review is part of a larger paper, the
introduction and conclusion pieces may be just a few sentences while you focus most of your
attention on the body. Conclusion: Summarize the key findings you have taken from the literature
and emphasize their significance Connect it back to your primary research question How should I
organize my lit 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. There are
various approaches to organising the body of a literature review. Craft a list of search terms to use to
identify likely sources. Doing Your Literature Review: Traditional and Systematic Techniques. In
addition to providing the reader with background information relevant to the topic or research
question, a literature review may help to identify gaps in the current body of knowledge or criticize
previous research practices as a way to present potential for future research. Some useful databases to
search for journals and articles include: Your university’s library catalogue Google Scholar Project
Muse (humanities and social sciences) Medline (life sciences and biomedicine) EconLit (economics)
Inspec (physics, engineering and computer science) You can also use boolean operators to help
narrow down your search. You need to critically review the literature and synthesise your analysis
into a logical argument. This step will help you work out the structure of your literature review and
(if applicable) show how your own research will contribute to existing knowledge. However, a
literature review isn’t as simple as merely listing the material you’ve found and expecting the reader
to connect the dots. Types of Literature Review You tin reach the purpose we have discussed above
in several ways. Like any other academic text, your literature review should have an introduction, a
main body, and a conclusion. A methodological scope will influence either the types of documents in
the review or the way in which these documents are discussed. If it’s your first time writing a
literature review, you definitely want to use this link to get 50% off the course (limited-time offer).
This is important because it allows you to focus your own research on filling these gaps. We'll show
you how to make this tough task simpler. If there are conflicting studies, why do you think that is.
That means that you will have to be able to summarize each source and evaluate the quality of each
source, the assumptions each author made, and the value of their data and conclusions. Data
synthesis Reporting the review Explaining how results will be displayed sorting the data Writing the
results and their interpretation Evaluating the results Threats to Study Validity Conclusion
References Appendices Conclusion Finally, we recommend that you read the references and
examples of systematic reviews we have selected below to learn more about this type of literature
review, as this article is not intended to be a complete guide. It also does the hard work of
identifying the best quality literature for you to move through the writing process faster. In other
words, a complete understanding the research problem requires you to deliberately examine how
knowledge and perspectives have changed over time. As you’re doing your research, create an
annotated bibliography ( see our page on the this type of document ). The scope of your review will
depend on your topic and discipline: in the sciences you usually only review recent literature, but in
the humanities you might take a long historical perspective (for example, to trace how a concept has
changed in meaning over time). Cite this Scribbr article If you want to cite this source, you can copy
and paste the citation or click the “Cite this Scribbr article” button to automatically add the citation
to our free Citation Generator. At that place is ane sufficient problem in this type, by the style. What
are the strengths and weaknesses of the research. Unlike other assignment types, you're often
expected to determine the purpose of a literature review yourself. Validity -- are the author's
arguments and conclusions convincing.