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- CAREER FEATURE
- 04 December 2020
- Correction 09 December 2020
How to write a superb literature review
Andy Tay is a freelance writer based in Singapore.
You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar
Literature reviews are important resources for scientists. They provide historical context for a field while offering opinions on its future trajectory. Creating them can provide inspiration for one’s own research, as well as some practice in writing. But few scientists are trained in how to write a review — or in what constitutes an excellent one. Even picking the appropriate software to use can be an involved decision (see ‘Tools and techniques’). So Nature asked editors and working scientists with well-cited reviews for their tips.
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doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-020-03422-x
Interviews have been edited for length and clarity.
Updates & Corrections
Correction 09 December 2020 : An earlier version of the tables in this article included some incorrect details about the programs Zotero, Endnote and Manubot. These have now been corrected.
Hsing, I.-M., Xu, Y. & Zhao, W. Electroanalysis 19 , 755–768 (2007).
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Ledesma, H. A. et al. Nature Nanotechnol. 14 , 645–657 (2019).
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Brahlek, M., Koirala, N., Bansal, N. & Oh, S. Solid State Commun. 215–216 , 54–62 (2015).
Choi, Y. & Lee, S. Y. Nature Rev. Chem . https://doi.org/10.1038/s41570-020-00221-w (2020).
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IMAGES
VIDEO
COMMENTS
WRITING A TARGETED LITERATURE REVIEW a targeted literature review is NOT: ¡ a sophisticated evaluation of the entire literature or literatures related to your topic ¡ a set of thinly connected summaries of important related works haphazardly selected from many subfields a targeted literature review IS: ¡ a carefully curated set of sources from a small number of subfield literatures
HOW TO WRITE A LITERATURE REVIEW COMPILED BY THE NORTHWESTERN WRITING PLACE This resource is adapted from the Graduate Writing Place's workshop "Tackling a Literature Review & Synthesizing the Work of Others." For more information about our workshops, see Graduate Writing Workshops. INTRODUCTION
A literature review is a review or discussion of the current published material available on a particular topic. It attempts to synthesizeand evaluatethe material and information according to the research question(s), thesis, and central theme(s). In other words, instead of supporting an argument, or simply making a list of summarized research ...
Examples of literature reviews. Step 1 - Search for relevant literature. Step 2 - Evaluate and select sources. Step 3 - Identify themes, debates, and gaps. Step 4 - Outline your literature review's structure. Step 5 - Write your literature review.
something is done to that material. In a quality literature review, the. "something" that is done to the literature should include synthesis or integrative. work that provides a new perspective on the topic (Boote & Penny 2005; Torraco. 2005), resulting in a review that is more than the sum of the parts. A quality.
in undertaking a traditional or narrative review of the Table 2. The literature review process • Selecting a review topic • Searching the literature • Gathering, reading and analysing the literature • Writing the review • References literature {Table 2). The first step involves identifying the subject ofthe literature review.
Sciences, need to be able to write a literature review. Whether they are writing a short review as part of an Honours assignment, or a full-length chapter in a PhD thesis, students consistently find it a struggle to turn the mass of diverse material found in a literature search into a well-organised critical discussion. The literature on ...
The best proposals are timely and clearly explain why readers should pay attention to the proposed topic. It is not enough for a review to be a summary of the latest growth in the literature: the ...
The Writing Center Literature Reviews What this handout is about This handout will explain what a literature review is and offer insights into the form and construction of a literature review in the humanities, social sciences, and sciences. Introduction OK. You've got to write a literature review. You dust off a novel and a book of poetry ...
When writing a literature review it is important to start with a brief introduction, followed by the text broken up into subsections and conclude with a summary to bring everything together. A summary table including title, author, publication date and key findings is a useful feature to present in your review (see Table 1 for an example).
A literature review may be as short as a single sentence or as long as several pages (in which case it is usually presented in a sec-tion of its own headed "Literature Review" or something similar). In many journal articles, the literature review appears as part of the introduction. literature review should do at least four things, the ...
A literature review is a surveys scholarly articles, books and other sources relevant to a particular. issue, area of research, or theory, and by so doing, providing a description, summary, and ...
2. Steps for writing a literature review . 1. Format of a literature review . A literature review follows an essay format (Introduction, Body, Conclusion) if you are asked to write it as a stand-alone essay. • Introduction . Topic sentences that contextualise your review (purpose, significance and scope) Following sentence/s that state ...
A literature review is a compilation, classification, and evaluation of what other researchers have written on a particular topic. A literature review normally forms part of a research thesis but it can also stand alone as a self-contained review of writings on a subject. In either case, its purpose is to: Place each work in the context of its ...
There are several stages to writing a literature review: a. select your topic; b. select and read your sources; ... A good research topic focuses on a subject that has been well explored. That is, one where you can find articles that reflect growth and change in an area of research. 8. Your topic needs to be narrow and focused. ... view.pdf 40 ...
Utilizing proper keywords or controlled vocabulary is essential for effectively exploring a wide range of literature. Step 3: Selecting resources. This step is relevant for extracting the desired ...
Your introduction should give an outline of why you are writing the review, and why the topic is important. ü "the scope of the review — what aspects of the topic will be discussed. ü the criteria used for your literature selection (e.g. type of sources used, date range) ü the organisational pattern of the review" (Citewrite, 2016 ...
WRITING MOVES TO MAKE WHEN WRITING A LITERATURE REVIEW: SYNTHESIZE. •Synthesize the information you've gathered and comment on it. • Synthesis: the composition or combination of parts or elements so as to form a whole • Imagine that you are having a dinner party. You as the researcher/writer are the host, and your guests are the ...
needed to write a literature review. Writing a literature review is not instinctive, so without these skills, students are con-fused and stressed, and professors frequently are disappointed with the resulting work. Second, why you or other researchers need a literature review is rarely discussed, or when it is, it is quickly glossed over.
usually be some element of literature review in the introduction. And if you have to write a grant application, you will be expected to review the work that has already been done in your area. However, just because we all have to do this a lot, doesn't make the task any easier, and indeed for many, writing a literature review is one of
When searching the literature for pertinent papers and reviews, the usual rules apply: be thorough, use different keywords and database sources (e.g., DBLP, Google Scholar, ISI Proceedings, JSTOR Search, Medline, Scopus, Web of Science), and. look at who has cited past relevant papers and book chapters.
The literature in a research study accomplishes several purposes: (a) It. shares with the reader the results of other studies that are closely related. to the study being reported (Fraenkel ...
Writing a Literature Review. A literature review is a document or section of a document that collects key sources on a topic and discusses those sources in conversation with each other (also called synthesis ). The lit review is an important genre in many disciplines, not just literature (i.e., the study of works of literature such as novels ...
The Online Writing Lab at Purdue University houses writing resources and instructional material, and we provide these as a free service of the Writing Lab at Purdue. Students, members of the community, and users worldwide will find information to assist with many writing projects.
94 PEDAGOGISCHE STUDIËN 2021 (98) 94-111 A literature review on interconnected reading and writing instruction Since reading and writing are considered interconnected language skills from a ...