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How to Write a Literature Review

A literature review summarizes the research conducted for a project, distinct from an abstract which summarizes the work itself. It should be structured like an essay, with an introduction, body paragraphs, and a conclusion, while adhering to formal academic writing style. The process involves defining research scope, finding relevant literature, identifying themes, creating an outline, and writing the review, ensuring proper citation to avoid plagiarism.

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17 views4 pages

How to Write a Literature Review

A literature review summarizes the research conducted for a project, distinct from an abstract which summarizes the work itself. It should be structured like an essay, with an introduction, body paragraphs, and a conclusion, while adhering to formal academic writing style. The process involves defining research scope, finding relevant literature, identifying themes, creating an outline, and writing the review, ensuring proper citation to avoid plagiarism.

Uploaded by

alamshahkhan5556
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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A literature review is not the same thing as an abstract.

Both are critical parts of

a research project, but while an abstract summarizes your work, a literature review

summarizes the research you conducted to complete your work. In many cases, an

abstract’s goal is to engage readers and help researchers and cataloguers determine

whether your work is a relevant source for their work and whether it’s a good fit for a

specific collection or academic journal. A literature review’s goal is to provide a “behind

the scenes” look at how you did your research, underpinning it as a valid piece of

scholarly research.

How to write a literature review

Structure

A literature review is structured similarly to an essay. It begins with an introduction that

states the research question and explains how you tackled it. Following are body

paragraphs that explain your research in further detail. Then, it ends with a conclusion

section that reiterates the research question while summarizing the insights you had

through your research. A literature review’s length depends largely on the type of

research it’s being written for. For a short paper, it might only be a few pages long, but

for a lengthy work like a thesis or dissertation, it’s often an entire chapter.

Style

A literature review requires the same style as any other piece of academic writing. That

means no contractions or colloquialisms, concise language, formal tone, and an

objective perspective at all times. To distinguish between your analysis and prior

scholarly work in the field, use the past tense when discussing the previous research

conducted on your topic and the present tense when discussing your point of view. For

example, you might write that a specific author conducted research or that they had
been influenced by earlier researchers in the field, but also that you are exploring

different research methods and that you are posing certain questions.

Writing a literature review, step by step

Define your research scope

If you haven’t yet narrowed your research focus down to a specific, answerable

question, do that before you move forward with finding sources. Once you have a clear,

specific thesis for your work, write a list of keywords related to that thesis you can use to

streamline your source-gathering process.

Find relevant literature

Using the keywords, you listed, search for relevant sources through your university

library and/or databases like Google Scholar, JSTOR, EBSCO, and field-specific

databases like Project Muse and EconLit.

As you find potential sources, read their abstracts to determine whether they are within

your research’s scope. By reading a quick preview of each source you can pare down

your list to a collection of works that provide the data, insights, and additional content

you need to conduct your research.

Identify themes, patterns, and gaps within your body of sources

Read your pared-down body of sources. As you conduct your research, take note of the

themes present in them and ask questions:

• Do different authors agree with each other on these themes?

• Where do they disagree?


• How does each author support their position?

Create a literature review outline

Writing an outline is an important part of the writing process. Once you’ve read your

sources and you understand their themes, patterns, and connections to each other, it’s

time to organize your strategy for writing about how you’ve used them in your research

by creating an outline.

There are a few different ways you can organize your outline. You can organize

it chronologically, listing and discussing the oldest sources you’ve consulted and

working up to the latest pieces. You can also organize your sources according to

their themes, creating a section for each shared theme you encountered and

discussing it there. Another way to organize your sources in your outline is to group

them according to the research methods used by their authors.

The best way to organize your literature review often depends on your subject area. In

the humanities, presenting your sources chronologically or according to their themes

can effectively highlight how existing research on your subject has evolved.

Write your literature review

Once your outline is complete, it’s time to start writing. In nearly all cases, literature

reviews are written in the third person. For example, you might discuss a scholarly

article by stating “this paper argues . . .” or “in her work, the author elaborates on . . .”

However, there are cases where first person is appropriate in a literature review, such

as when you’re referencing your own research. For example, if you’re citing an earlier

paper, you’ve written or data collected from a study you conducted, you may use

phrases like “I argue,” “I propose,” and “through my research, I found that . . .”


Remember to follow the style you’re using for your research paper, whether that’s MLA,

APA, or another style. Similarly, use the same objective academic tone you’ll use in

your research paper. Don’t just list and describe the sources you’ve read; respond to

them, interpret them, and critically evaluate them. Keep in mind that you don’t have to

agree with every source you use—in fact, exploring where your findings diverge from a

source’s findings can be a strong point in your literature review and your research as a

whole.

Don’t forget to write an annotated bibliography of all your sources. Failing to cite your

sources correctly can get you in trouble for plagiarism, which can potentially result in

having your work discredited or even being expelled from your university.

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