A literature review is a comprehensive study and interpretation of literature that addresses a specific topic.
Literature reviews are generally conducted in one of two ways:
1) As a preliminary review before a larger study in order to critically evaluate the current literature and justify why further study and research is required.
2) As a project in itself that provides a comprehensive survey of the works published in a particular discipline or area of research over a specified period of time.
Why conduct a literature review? They provide you with a handy guide to a particular topic. If you have limited time to conduct research, literature reviews can give you an overview or act as a stepping stone.
More: different types of literature reviews on how to conduct a literature review.
Dr. Singh discusses the difference between a systematic review and a meta-analysis.
Conducting Your Literature Review by
This book is a step-by-step guide to writing a literature review, and includes tips for modifying the process as needed depending on your audience, purpose, and goals. The lessons in this book can be applied to writing the background section for a thesis or an original research publication. Literature reviews are now much more challenging to compile today than they used to be. You need a structured approach to handle the sheer volume of published research available. This book will help you formulate a strategy for making decisions about what to include and not include in your review, and produce a reliable and unbiased summary of the existing research. You will learn skills for defining research questions, using search tools and managing citations. This book is part of the American Psychological Association's Concise Guides to Conducting Behavioral, Health, and Social Science Research series. Aimed at undergraduate students in research methods courses or others with a lab or research project, each book describes a key stage in the research process. Collectively, these books provide a solid grounding in research from start to finish.
Doing a Systematic Review by
Written in a friendly, accessible style by an expert team of authors with years of experience in both conducting and supervising systematic reviews, this is the perfect guide to using systematic review methodology in a research project. It provides clear answers to all review-related questions, including: How do I formulate an appropriate review question? What's the best way to manage my review? How do I develop my search strategy? How do I get started with data extraction? How do I assess the quality of a study? How can I analyse and synthesize my data? How should I write up the discussion and conclusion sections of my dissertation or thesis?
Literature Review and Research Design: A Guide to Effective Research Practice by
Designing a research project is possibly the most difficult task a dissertation writer faces. It is fraught with uncertainty: what is the best subject? What is the best method? For every answer found, there are often multiple subsequent questions, so it's easy to get lost in theoretical debates and buried under a mountain of literature. This book looks at literature review in the process of research design, and how to develop a research practice that will build skills in reading and writing about research literature--skills that remain valuable in both academic and professional careers. Literature review is approached as a process of engaging with the discourse of scholarly communities that will help graduate researchers refine, define, and express their own scholarly vision and voice. This orientation on research as an exploratory practice, rather than merely a series of predetermined steps in a systematic method, allows the researcher to deal with the uncertainties and changes that come with learning new ideas and new perspectives. The focus on the practical elements of research design makes this book an invaluable resource for graduate students writing dissertations. Practicing research allows room for experiment, error, and learning, ultimately helping graduate researchers use the literature effectively to build a solid scholarly foundation for their dissertation research project.
Writing the Literature Review: A Practical Guide by
This accessible text provides a roadmap for producing a high-quality literature review--an integral part of a successful thesis, dissertation, term paper, or grant proposal. Each step of searching for, evaluating, analyzing, and synthesizing prior studies is clearly explained and accompanied by user-friendly suggestions, organizational tips, vignettes, and examples of student work. Also featured are excerpts from peer-reviewed quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods articles. This is the first book to focus on crafting different types of reviews (systematic, traditional-narrative, or hermeneutic-phenomenological) that reflect the writer's research question, methodological choices, and approaches to knowledge. It describes what all reviews have in common and highlights distinct characteristics of each type. The book includes dos and don'ts for evaluating studies and constructing an argument, and software suggestions for locating, organizing, and arranging sources. Pedagogical Features *Checklists and "To Do" activities that break down key steps to take. *Boxed examples, graphics that organize and visually illustrate key concepts, and summary tables. *Group activities that invite students to further explore and apply the methods discussed in each chapter. *Detailed directions for using four different organizing strategies: synthesis matrix, summary table, mapping, and topic outline. *End-of-chapter summaries and "What's Next" sections. *Assessment matrices for reviewing and refining the completed literature review. Winner (First Place)--American Journal of Nursing Book of the Year Award, Nursing Research Category