Topic outline

  • Writing a literature review

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    A literature review demonstrates your knowledge of your field: 1) what is known and 2) what is unknown or remains to be investigated about your topic ('your niche').

    Writing activity

    Name your research topic and list three things researchers know and don’t know about it. 

    Table to list what is known and unknown about research topic
    The function of the literature review in your proposal is to: 'review relevant research and theory, provide an integrated statement that affords some explanation of why the literature is important to the research the candidate proposes to undertake (see Guidelines for the preparation of a research proposal). 

    A literature review is a review of empirical findings in research studies and theoretical studies which are relevant to your topic. Distinguish research studies from background contextual or statistical resources which are often used in introductions rather than the literature review section.

    Activity: Check your knowledge about the literature review. 

    Which statements do you think would apply to your research proposal writing? Note: some might be ‘trick’ statements.

    1. The preparation of a literature review is a three-step process: finding the relevant literature, reading and then writing up the review.
    2. The literature review should be as long as possible to persuade your reader that you have read very widely.
    3. You need to include all the previous research that is related to your topic.
    4. You can safely ignore literature that is not directly related to your topic.
    5. Your literature review is important because it demonstrates that the findings, theory or analysis you present are a contribution to a cumulative process.
    6. Your literature review needs to explain clearly which potential areas for inclusion have not been covered in the review and why they have been omitted.
    7. Your literature review should discuss problems and/or controversies within your field.
    8. Your literature review should be presented in a chronological order.
    9. Your literature review can help you discover conceptual traditions and frameworks used to examine problems.
    10. Your literature review should focus on very recent publications because they are likely to be the most relevant.
    11. Your literature review should help you reveal gaps in the existing body of research.
    12. In your literature review you should critically evaluate each piece of work included.

    Now compare your responses with the comments below from Swales & Feak (2004). 

    1. This comment suggests that preparing your literature review is a linear process when in fact you will be doing these three activities simultaneously. If only it were so simple.
    2. Length ≠ quality. Of course, your literature review needs to be thorough, but you need to concentrate on work that helps you establish your research story.
    3. Initially you might say yes but the question is what is your criteria for relevance? 'All' is a rather strong modifier. Some research may have a small amount of relevant literature, but other areas may have a lot of relevant work and you will need to exclude some pieces.
    4. Your first instinct might be to ignore work that is not directly related to your topic. However, novel and innovative research that is on another topic can often offer insights into your own work. If you are working on an interdisciplinary area, you will have already realised this.
    5. Yes, your research adds another ‘chapter’ to the research story on your topic. Some stories are ancient (eg medicine) while others are relatively new (eg mapping genes).
    6. Consider your audience. If you are excluding critical areas your audience might expect to be included, explain the scope of your work and the reasoning behind your choices.
    7. Yes. These are precisely the sorts of things that make your work interesting.
    8. No, not quite. While overall the literature review might be organised chronologically, it does not have to follow a strict chronological order. Rather, provide a synthesis and a big picture of the research.
    9. Yes.
    10. In certain fields, particularly in the hard sciences, this is the norm. However, in some cases, older works may be relevant.
    11. Yes.
    12. Providing a critique of each piece would be tedious and possibly tiresome for your reader. Critiquing each piece may isolate some research, but make it difficult to show the trends, patterns and directions in the research. Reserve your critique of individual research for key work that deserves individual attention; otherwise, focus on general trends, traditions or approaches.

    References

    Swales, J & Feak, C 2004, Academic writing for graduate students: essential tasks and skills, 2nd edn, The University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, Michigan, p. 117.

    This topic was written by Dr Monica Behrend.

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