Writing the Literature Review

Analyze

"Literature review" by NunoRibeiro is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0

• Skim the articles to get a general overview
• Use that overview to group articles by category (e.g. topic, subtopic, chronologically etc.)
• Take detailed notes about the articles using a consistent format
• Look for any definitions of key terms in the literature
• Take note when different authors use different definitions
• Look for key statistics
• Identify short notable quotes that you may want to use (sparingly) in your literature review
• Look for any strengths and weaknesses in methodology
• Make distinctions between the author's claims and the evidence in support of them
• Identify gaps in the literature
• Identify relationships between studies, when they present themselves
• Note any relationships to your topic
• Evaluate your references for their currency

Galvan, J. L. (2006). Writing literature reviews (3rd ed.). Glendale, CA: Pyrczak Publishing.