LITERATURE REVIEW ANALYSIS

Literature Review Analysis

Literature Review Analysis

How well does the literature review form the basis for the problem or the research question?

As in any scientific endeavor, the first stage of a literature review is to formulate a problem. Here, the central considerations involve the questions that the reviewer wishes to answer, the constructs of interest, and the population about which conclusions are drawn. A literature review can only answer questions about which prior work exists. For instance, to make conclusions of causality, the reviewer will need to rely on experimental (or perhaps longitudinal) studies; concurrent naturalistic studies would not provide answers to this question. Defining the constructs of interest poses two potential complications: The existing literature might use different terms for the same construct, or the existing literature might use similar terms to describe different constructs (Cooper, 2010).

The reviewer, therefore, needs to define clearly the constructs of interest when planning the review. Similarly, the reviewer must consider which samples will be included in the literature review, for instance, deciding whether studies of unique populations (e.g., prison, psychiatric settings) should be included within the review. The advantages of a broad approach (in terms of constructs and samples) are that the conclusions of the review will be more generalize and might allow for the identification of important differences among studies, but the advantages of a narrow approach are that the literature will likely be more consistent and the quantity of literature that must be reviewed is smaller.

How clearly is the literature review written? Whether you find it clearly written or not, provide justification for your conclusion?

Literature reviews are systematic syntheses of previous work around a particular topic. Nearly all scholars have written literature reviews at some point; such reviews are common requirements for class projects or as part of theses, are often the first section of empirical papers, and are sometimes written to summarize a field of study. Given the increasing amount of literature in many fields, reviews are critical in synthesizing scientific knowledge. Although common and important to science, literature reviews are rarely considered to be held to the same scientific rigor as other aspects of the research process.

This entry describes the types of literature reviews and scientific standards for conducting literature reviews. Most of the time literature reviews are clearly written according to the topic description which provides the reader with a clear understanding of the research paper. Literature review is the piece of work which relates the reader with the topic of the research paper, that is why most of the research writers emphasize on absolute and clear description of the research journal or paper. Literature review discloses appropriate theoretical structure of the study that helps to understand easily. It verifies that it has not been already done. It is the best way to establish the importance of the study (Houser 2007). Literature review is important to judge research question and to provide the latest research material for the readers. Literature review makes it sensible because it uses both the ...