how to write an excellent literature review

how to write an excellent literature review

How to Write an Excellent Literature Review

1. Introduction to Literature Review Writing

Whether or not you have written one yourself, you are likely at least slightly familiar with what a literature review is: a survey of scholarly sources related to a specific issue, area of research, or theory. Much like other academic texts, literature reviews follow a specific format and contain a number of key components, the most important of which are an introduction, a body that is divided into a number of categories/subsections, and a conclusion.

While the introduction familiarizes readers with the research question(s) that the literature review will address, the body is essentially an in-depth report on the state of research on a given topic, as well as an explanation of the way that this report is organized, what the main research questions are, a ‘roadmap’, a ‘signposting’ of the order of the subsections and methods of analysis.

The literature review contributes to an understanding of historical research and present knowledge, points out directions for further research, and ensures a common and in-depth knowledge about the area for both the writer and reader (which would in this case be the grader as well as other students). Unfortunately, it is not uncommon for students to struggle with completing this portion of their thesis and dissertations. “How to write…?” is one of the most common questions and unresolved problems of the modern student. Although such questions and problems are not frequently discussed upfront in the course or thesis instructions, they are implicitly embedded because they make up most of the language students use and the writing that trainers and examiners evaluate.

2. Key Components of a Literature Review

A literature review requires the writer to evaluate, analyze, and synthesize research published by academics and other professionals. It is a standard assignment in college courses, often contributing significantly to the final grade. To perfect this task and receive the best evaluations possible from one’s professors, one must implement certain strategies to engage with the literature in a compelling and analytical manner. The following will provide practical and detailed instructions on the matter, suitable for students of various levels and abilities.

An excellent literature review should contain a focused thesis statement or research question, and it should be clear how the review is organized around this statement. The sources in a literature review should come from a variety of field-related resources, including not only academic sources like peer-reviewed journal articles and books, but also sources like white papers and government documents when relevant. All citations and references used in the literature review should be complete, accurate, and properly formatted according to the style required by the discipline. The literature review should critically evaluate both primary and secondary sources, including developing an understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of research, and should not only summarize sources but synthesize their perspectives to contribute to the writer’s argument.

3. Effective Strategies for Conducting Literature Searches

Strategies for conducting effective literature searches

Conducting literature searches: Techniques and tools. Before you can write a literature review, you need to find literature relevant to your study. In the digital age, much of scholarly research is available electronically. As well as printed journals and monographs (specialist books), material is now available online in the collections of academic libraries. The more you practice using databases, the more likely you are to find material that is relevant to the topic you have chosen. Many subjects use specialist databases for their literature. Major indexes such as Web of Science, Scopus, ProQuest, JSTOR, and others allow for sophisticated searches and export results.

Search strategy. The results will differ depending upon the search terms you use, the limiters and filters you apply, and the content and topic of your review. Therefore, it’s important to define what you mean by effective or relevant results; prioritize content which fits your criteria (e.g., number of times an article is cited, up-to-date material & full-text availability), and monitor and evaluate the search results to ensure they are appropriate. Once you have had training in a range of databases, you will be able to exploit the specific functions and features to authorize a search with maximal potential for identifying all the literature available on a topic. A radio programme would have to be able to draw the participant out and enable them to tell the listening audience about literature searches in general, what they are, why they are done (some mention of the pitfalls would be good but not dwelt upon), how one can simply state the research question, open a computer or book, and get on with things (as would also be done in the way some people do things in more traditional literature searches). Then, from a pedagogical viewpoint, it would also be good for the programme to emphasize the importance of getting things right to develop and evaluate research-based knowledge.

4. Structuring and Organizing Your Literature Review

The literature review: Structuring and organizing

Structuring the content of your literature review will aid in ensuring you have a coherent and logical discussion of your topic. Start your literature review by discussing the most relevant and most current primary literature. This will provide a foundation for your research. As the literature review section moves along, it moves further away from your research topic and studies that are most similar to your research. Finally, your literature review should come full circle and return to your research. Do studies exist that are similar to your research and does it confirm or disagree with your findings? The ability to link your study to others at the beginning and at the end serves to validate the importance of your work. All the in-between studies serve to give background context for your research question.

Many people stress about organizing their content. The use of headings and subheadings adds structure to a lengthy and complex literature review. Separate large literature review sections into smaller ones if they are unwieldy. Optionally, use special formatting or styles to help signify the section breaks such as using all caps, underlining, or bold. The subheading formats should also follow a consistent style. For example, if you use roman numerals as the main heading style, then you may use upper- and lower-case letters for the subheading style. Each section of the literature review should flow into the next. Begin your literature review with an intro that discusses the literature review’s purpose and the main concepts that will be covered in the text. Helper material that defines and explains these main concepts can be provided here, or, if lengthy, you can put it in an appendix.

5. Critical Analysis and Synthesis of Literature

Having introduced the topic, the next section or sections will be a critical analysis of the literature you have found. In other words, this section will evaluate the work of other scholars around your chosen topic by critically assessing their works from a particular perspective. To do this, you will require a good understanding of these 3-4 papers and the methods they used to investigate your chosen topic.

Synthesis of the Literature – this part of the literature review will generally be between 5-10 journal articles (or book chapters) long. You will want to present 5 (and up to 10) or so journal articles (or books) that are related to your own paper. But where you described each of the first three categories separately, don’t separate them here. Instead, name the findings that are similar when discussing the first article, then do the same when discussing the second article (and third, and so forth). This will build upon your critical analysis and show how your chosen papers have helped you to think about the topic in a particular way. You will then produce a good literature review by integrating these 5-10 papers.