Critical Literature Review For Dummies
Critical Literature Review For Dummies
From identifying relevant sources to synthesizing information and presenting coherent arguments,
the process can quickly become overwhelming. However, with the right guidance and support,
mastering the art of literature review writing is within reach.
One of the biggest challenges faced by individuals embarking on literature reviews is the sheer
volume of information available. Sorting through numerous scholarly articles, books, and other
sources to pinpoint those that are most relevant to the topic at hand can be time-consuming and
frustrating.
Once relevant sources have been identified, the next hurdle is synthesizing the information in a
meaningful way. This involves critically analyzing each source, identifying key themes and
arguments, and evaluating the strengths and weaknesses of existing research.
Finally, presenting the findings of the literature review in a clear, concise manner is essential.
Organizing the information in a logical structure and effectively communicating key insights is
crucial for demonstrating understanding and credibility.
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It can exist a plus if you clarify the applicability of your literature review in further research.
Chronological The simplest approach is to trace the development of the topic over time. A clear
account of how the author conducted the analysis makes the key findings more credible. The
literature review provides a description, summary and evaluation of each source. For instance, the
sperm whale review could focus on the development of the harpoon for whale hunting. However,
progression of time may still be an important factor in a thematic review. A literature review does not
demonstrate what you know but what you have learned from your analysis of the topic or field.
Appointments are also available with an Academic Engagement Librarian to discuss any issues you
might be having with research. Remember that you can use our template to summarise and evaluate
sources you’re thinking about using. You need to reread the paragraphs very fast, and think about
similarities and differences they have. Brand a list of references for inquiry you've used and apply
proper commendation rules. As a publication, a lit review usually is meant to help make other
scholars’ lives easier by collecting and summarizing, synthesizing, and analyzing existing research on
a topic. If your college requires you to write an undergrad dissertation. This is common in the social
sciences and humanities. Instead, looking for similar themes and subjects, you are supposed to
discuss how different researchers approached the same issues. Literature reviews are written
occasionally in the humanities, but mostly in the sciences and social sciences; What the literature
review does not do: If you have no idea about how to write literature review for thesis. This
technique will give you a strong indication of which points were clearly communicated and which
weren’t. Roblyer et al. (2010) found that in higher education, students are more positive towards
faculty. 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. Students should always
cross-check any information on this site with their course teacher. It plays a significant role in
establishing the relationships between theories that still exist and examines what extent these theories
have been investigated. Hoboken, nj: Wiley-Blackwell; 2008. Jesson J., Matheson L., Lacey F.M.
Doing your literature review: traditional and systematic techniques. Please note: The length of your
introduction and overview, the number of points you choose to review, and the length of your
conclusion should be proportionate to the page limit stated in your assignment and should reflect the
complexity of the material being reviewed as well as the expectations of your reader. Two members
of the research team selected the articles using a pre-established list of inclusion and exclusion
criteria and following a two-step procedure. Source: image.slidesharecdn.com Writing a literature
review involves finding relevant publications (such as books and journal articles), critically analyzing
them, and explaining what you found. You will often see the terms “the research,” “the scholarship,”
and “the literature” used mostly interchangeably. The theoretical literature review helps to establish
what theories exist, the relationships between them, the degree the existing approaches have been
investigated, and to develop new hypotheses to be tested. Thank you very much, very helpful This is
very educative and precise. Literature reviews vary; there are many ways to write a literature review
based on discipline, material type, and other factors. Fink, Arlene. Conducting Research Literature
Reviews: From the Internet to Paper.
But before you go, Six Online Tools for Easy Literature Review Evaluating literature review:
systematic vs. Writing literature reviews effectively is a must in grad school. What are the central
themes and categories used by the researchers. Recharge Your Resume and Boost Your Chances
Fresh Grads. 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. Identifying a
research gap Literature reviews can identify which developments occurred and where a gap or
puzzle remains that can be informed by further inquiry. Charlesworth Author Services, a trusted
brand supporting the world’s leading academic publishers, institutions and authors since 1928. That
is because the survey nature of the literature review does not allow for in-depth discussion or
detailed quotes from the text. Writing Your Literature Review Once you've settled on how to
organize your literature review, you're ready to write each section. Only then you can proceed to a
part of a general overview to show the current perspectives and arguments. Try writing a simple
statement that lets the reader know what is your main organizing principle. Related items that
provide additional information but that are not key to understanding the research problem can be
included in a list of further readings. 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. Write the conclusion You will
want to use the conclusion to state your overall critical evaluation. The chances are high that someone
will already have published a literature review ( Figure 1 ), if not exactly on the issue you are
planning to tackle, at least on a related topic. Literature Review Outline We've already discussed the
importance of a literature review outline. 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.
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. For each publication, ask yourself: What question or
problem is the author addressing. Usually you will need to synthesize research rather than just
summarizing it. Standards: Description of the way in which you present your information. When you
have multiple sources cited in a paragraph, you are more likely to be synthesizing them (not always,
but often Read more about synthesis here. Many people would prefer to sit down and read an article
than sit down and craft what they have already read. In other words, after grappling with the
literature you’ll have an opinion about what the trends and concerns are in the field as well as what’s
lacking. You decide on the headings that are important and useful to your process, and how you
create the table (Excel, Word, etc). LexiVibe: Virtual Reality-based Vocabulary Learning
Environment for Visually. Identifies critical gaps and points of disagreement. Our recommended
credit includes the statement: Written by, or adapted from, Vanderbilt University Libraries (current as
of.). If you remix, transform, or build upon the material, you must distribute your contributions
under the same license as the original. Step 4: Identify Relationships, Key Ideas, and Gaps Before
you can move on to outlining and writing your literature review, the final step is determining the
relationships between the studies that already exist. Assuming the role of an analytical reader will
also help you to determine whether or not the author fulfills the stated purpose of the book or article
and enhances your understanding or knowledge of a particular topic.
Extra Tips for Busy Students And there is one more option — you just don’t have time to learn this
new technique or any other technique for that matter and you just need your literature review written
on time. Should your review include subheadings or background information for your sources. To do
this, you must interpret any data you have, shed light on the gaps in previous research works, and
explain how your research will or is filling these gaps. They can provide fundamental theories and
findings critical to your review and link to previous, useful literature. The body paragraphs should
flow easily from one to the next. A thematic review would have subtopics based upon factors that
relate to the theme or issue. Consider the following issues before writing the literature review:
Clarify If your assignment is not very specific about what form your literature review should take,
seek clarification from your professor by asking these questions: 1. Here are five steps to writing an
excellent literature review. Here’s more on how you can use it: Find the right information Find what
you want quickly and easily with comprehensive search filters that let you narrow down papers
according to PDF availability, year of publishing, document type, and affiliated institution. A
literature review may be a stand alone work or the introduction to a larger research paper, depending
on the assignment. Boost your grades is to place an order in a few quick clicks and we will satisfy
your write my paper request. I was struggling to come up with a sensible literature review but this
has been really helpful. If you have limited time to conduct research, literature reviews can give you
an overview or act as a stepping stone. Argumentative literature review starts with a problem
statement. Further Readings Generative AI and Writing USC Libraries Tutorials and Other Guides
Bibliography A literature review surveys prior research published in books, scholarly articles, and any
other sources relevant to a particular issue, area of research, or theory, and by so doing, provides a
description, summary, and critical evaluation of these works in relation to the research problem being
investigated. 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. 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. For instance, Levy
and Ellis (2006) proposed a generic framework for conducting such reviews. As a piece of writing,
the literature review must be defined by a guiding concept (e.g., your research objective, the problem
or issue you are discussing, or your argumentative thesis). It should only take two or three devoted
sessions. Systematic Approaches to a Successful Literature Review. To help you build a conceptual
framework for empirical testing (if applicable to your research topic). The ability of your hereafter
text is in the proper planning. They include empirical research, firsthand accounts of events and other
original materials. Finally, a Lit Review has its own set of in-text citations and a Works Cited list.
This way, by the time you have read the literature you selected, you will already have a rough draft
of the review. This will break your heart if you think about it very long, as much with grief as joy.
This site is one thing that is required on the internet, someone with a little originality. 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. Yet somehow it’s also what makes life worth living.
Writing a literature review involves discussing your collected studies by describing prominent
themes, theoretical or empirical aspects that are missing or underexplored, or a combination of both.
You might argue for the relevance of a specific theoretical approach, or combine various theoretical
concepts to create a framework for your research. It is not just a descriptive list of the material
available, or a set of summaries. Check out Scribbr’s professional proofreading services. Sort through
other current bibliographies or literature reviews in the field to get a sense of what your discipline
expects. However, with the chronological approach, the emphasis is very firmly on how the
discussion has evolved over time, as opposed to how all the literature links together (which we’ll
discuss next ). Two members of the research team selected the articles using a pre-established list of
inclusion and exclusion criteria and following a two-step procedure. Normally, you would need
much more time to deal with this kind of assignment, but with our guide you can beat that scarily
close deadline. Inclusion and exclusion criteria must be established to help researchers eliminate
studies that are not aligned with the research questions. It is not enough for a review to be a
summary of the latest growth in the literature: the. Narrow the Topic The narrower your topic, the
easier it will be to limit the number of sources you need to read in order to obtain a good survey of
relevant resources. The processes should go in parallel, you need to work on annotated bibliography
first, put everything together nice and tight and only later start writing an actual literature review.
Creating them can provide inspiration for one’s own research, as well as some practice in writing. I
requested to download the free literature review template, however, your website wouldn’t allow
me to complete the request or complete a download. Understand who the top voices are in your
topic's academic field, and be sure to include the most pertinent publications by those scholars.
Lamb, Sandra E. 1998. How to Write It: A Complete Guide to Everything You’ll Ever Write.
Required writing for a journal article, thesis or dissertation, grant application, etc. Extra Resources
For extra help with all aspects of study skills including how to undertake literature reviews,
appointments are available with learning advisors on Engage. Note that more authentic thematic
reviews tend to break away from chronological order. Sources for a literature review should be as
current as possible or not older than ten years. At this stage, you are close to writing the review
itself. Systematic Approaches to a Successful Literature Review. That means you will discuss and
evaluate point one within the same paragraph (or in several if the point is significant and warrants
extended discussion) before you summarize and evaluate point two, point three, etc., moving in a
logical sequence from point to point to point. How does the work relate to a discipline, to a
profession, to a particular audience, or to other works on the topic. Thematic: If you have found
some recurring central themes that you will continue working with throughout your piece, you can
organize your literature review into subsections that address different aspects of the topic. She is
exceptionally intuitive, as masterly as a great painter. When we say “literature review” or refer to
“the literature,” we are talking about the research ( scholarship ) in a given field. Types of Literature
Reviews It is important to think of knowledge in a given field as consisting of three layers. For
example, MLA requires a Works Cited page, whereas the Chicago Manual of Style requires a
Bibliography. For example, if you are writing your paper in apa style, read the literature review
guidelines online so that you know how to properly format your paper.
Use Evidence A literature review section is, in this sense, just like any other academic research paper.
Print Friendly Have a language expert improve your writing Run a free plagiarism check in 10
minutes, automatically generate references for free. The term “confirmation bias,” for example, refers
to the tendency to focus on evidence which supports one’s existing beliefs, which can lead to
overlooking alternative hypotheses. 5. Challenge Your Own Assumptions If you come across a study
which seems to oppose your hypothesis, consider whether it presents good counterarguments to your
own position. However, progression of time may still be an important factor in a thematic review. To
emphasize the importance of a literature review, writing a literature review, and incorporating
literature reviews in research, let's examine its place in scholarly inquiry. They should arise out of
your organizational strategy. Organize using a logical plan Organize the body of your review
according to a logical plan. Thematic review Simply put, a thematic literature review aims to identify
key themes or concepts that frequently appear in the collected studies. There are numerous ways to
find relevant literature, but I’ll cover my top four tactics here. Evaluate sources. Identify themes,
debates and gaps. Results indicate that the majority of systematic reviews in this particular area
suffer from important methodological flaws and biases that impair their internal validity and limit
their usefulness for clinical and decision-making purposes. If you first with a well-defined structure,
it's nearly 100% you'll reach exceptional results. If you want to work smart, you don't want to miss
this. Federal government websites often end in.gov or.mil. Before sharing sensitive information,
make sure you're on a federal government site. It is important to keep track of your sources with
citations to avoid plagiarism. If your lit review is a standalone piece, the introduction and conclusion
take up more space and give you a place to discuss your goals, research methods, and conclusions
separately from where you discuss the literature itself. If your inquiry revolves around study tools,
for example, what tools appear to be studied more often than others. 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. While we try to offer
these once per academic year, we find providing the recording to be helpful to community members
who have missed the session. It is however advisable to reread the draft one more time before
submission, as a last-minute correction of typos, leaps, and muddled sentences may enable the
reviewers to focus on providing advice on the content rather than the form. Look at how the review
is done by covering key information from the study while. Some scientists may be overly
enthusiastic about what they have published, and thus risk giving too much importance to their own
findings in the review. 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.
Use Quotes Sparingly Some short quotes are okay if you want to emphasize a point, or if what an
author stated cannot be easily paraphrased. Your stand must go beyond your “gut reaction” to the
work and be based on your knowledge (readings, lecture, experience) of the topic as well as on
factors such as criteria stated in your assignment or discussed by you and your instructor. Begin
composing Once you’ve settled on a general pattern of organization, you’re ready to write each
section. Use a range of keywords to search databases such as PsycINFO and any others that may
contain relevant articles. As an author, you can discuss and interpret the research question and its
various aspects and debate your adopted methods to support the claim. Long story short, this chapter
is a pretty big deal, which is why you want to make sure you get it right. Based on your reading and
notes, you can look for: Trends and patterns (in theory, method or results): do certain approaches
become more or less popular over time.
These are 3: introduction, main body, and the decision. What situation (i.e., racism on college
campuses) provides a basis for the author’s assertions. The exceptions are when you have statements
describing events that happened earlier than the literature you are reviewing or events that are
currently occurring; then, you can use the past perfect or present perfect tenses. Correct my
document today Writing literature reviews can be quite challenging. Literature reviews can take two
major forms. The most prevalent one is the “literature review” or “background” section within a
journal paper or a chapter in a graduate thesis. There are various approaches to organising the body of
a literature review. Your interpretation of the available sources must be backed up with evidence to
show that what you are saying is valid. Then, even if you come across great books on other topics,
make sure you only get articles and books in those fields. As a result, it builds a basement for further
inquiry. The purpose is to place research in a historical context to show familiarity with state-of-the-
art developments and to identify the likely directions for future research. This way, you will not miss
any truly worthwhile publication for review. Structuring your literature review thematically would
mean structuring your literature review’s body section to discuss each of these themes, one section at
a time. Currently, you are trying your best to get an undergraduate degree or your Master’s degree
and it is understandable that you have to do a first-rate dissertation literature review as one of the
assigned tasks. You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar Literature reviews are
important resources for scientists. However, not all students know that they will also have to face
another type of paper known as a Literature Review in college. Notation each of import insights you
lot come across. Here’s a quick recap of what you need to keep in mind when deciding on your
literature review structure: Just like other chapters, your literature review needs a clear introduction,
body and conclusion. This approach should only be followed if a clear path of research building on
previous research can be identified and that these trends follow a clear chronological order of
development. The exact keywords can be extended to widen your research over other databases and
academic search engines like: Google Scholar Microsoft Academic Science.gov Besides, it is not
advisable to go through every resource word by word. The subsections might include how they are
personified, how their proportions are exaggerated, and their behaviors misunderstood. The type of
information you choose to mention should relate directly to the research problem, whether it is
thematic, methodological, or chronological. This helps ringfence your review and achieve a clear
focus. Making it the most accurate and reliable proofreading tool for students. Does it confirm, add
to, or challenge established knowledge. Eugenie smiles enigmatically and shakes her head; she
doesn’t wish to change anything. For example, if you are writing your paper in apa style, read the
literature review guidelines online so that you know how to properly format your paper. In these
cases, systematic reviews can use qualitative synthesis methods such as vote counting, content
analysis, classification schemes and tabulations, as an alternative approach to narratively synthesize
the results of the independent studies included in the review. Well, there are (at least) four core
functions: For you to gain an understanding (and demonstrate this understanding) of where the
research is at currently, what the key arguments and disagreements are. That is, use the introduction
to state the particular aspect of your research area. So rather than trying to fetch every detail, you
have to analyze and decide which research sources resemble closest and appear relevant to your
chosen domain.