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The Ins & Outs of a Professional Literature Review: Purpose, Methods and Structure

This is Sylvia from WordifyScience. This blog post aims to follow up an earlier post where I described the Literature Review as an integrated section in a Masters or Doctoral Thesis. However, a Literature Review can also be a standalone piece of work. Whereas I highlighted the approach to performing a Literature Review in my earlier post, here I aim to describe the Literature Review in a broader context, discussing its purpose, 3 easy steps to get started, methods to organize the reviewed material and the actual structure of the written Literature Review.

Before diving into the details of performing your Literature Review, it is of crucial importance to describe your purpose. The actual review you will be performing will look completely different whether you integrate it in a Masters Thesis, a Doctoral Thesis, or a more comprehensive piece of work, such as a standalone systematic review.



1. Describing Your Purpose


What are you actually trying to achieve with the Literature Review? Is it an integrated part in your Masters Thesis? Or are you performing a more detailed doctoral level research? Or even a systematic review?


" Systematic review or meta-analysis? A systematic review answers a defined research question by collecting and summarizing all empirical evidence that fits pre-specified eligibility criteria. A meta-analysis is the use of statistical methods to summarize the results of these studies. "

In all cases, your research question is the central starting point. Make sure that you state your research question clearly, leaving no room for ambiguity. It can also be helpful to describe the target audience who will read your review, as this can provide valuable hints as to which expectations you will need to meet. The clearer you are about what it actually is that you are trying to answer with your research, the more focused your review will be.


It can be helpful in this case to identify individual scientific areas that have contributed to the research body in your area, or related fields. In my earlier blog post, I speak in more detail about the method of using a Venn Diagram in order to identify your individual areas for consideration in your Literature Review.


2. The actual Literature Review process: 3 easy steps


Once you have identified the individual areas that you want to examine, you follow a 3-step approach:

  1. Search for relevant literature

  2. Identify major themes and gaps in that literature

  3. Analyze your results and write the literature review


These steps can be further broken down as follows:

  1. Search for relevant literature

    1. define literature search strategy with inclusion and exclusion criteria

    2. evaluate published and unpublished sources

    3. for published research, conduct literature search with selected keywords on PubMed, Web of Science or Google Scholar

  2. Identify major themes and gaps in that literature

    1. select papers for analysis based on title and abstract

    2. final selection of papers based on full text (pdf file)

    3. extract data from selected papers

  3. Analyze your results and write the literature review

    1. outline the structure

    2. analyze results from extracted data

    3. summarize results


I cannot highlight enough that you will want to document your steps early on, and not only when it is time to write up your literature review approach and results. It is also essential to document the inclusion and exclusion criteria for your search, and have a clear search strategy in the first place.


When identifying major themes and gaps in your target literature, it can be helpful to use a spreadsheet (such as MS Excel) to organize your thoughts. This can be handy to not lose the oversight and bigger picture of what you are aiming at with your research. You will find yourself zooming in and out repeatedly: by diving deeply into individual research papers, and then again zooming out to look at the respective findings from a bigger perspective, and analyzing them objectively in the context of your own research.


When analyzing your results, these key questions can be very helpful to keep in mind:

  • What are the key terms and concepts?

  • How relevant is this article to my specific topic?

  • What are the major relationships, trends and patterns?

  • How has the author structured the arguments?

  • How authoritative and credible is this source?

  • What are the differences and similarities between the sources?

  • Are there any gaps in the literature that require further study?



3. Organizing your Literature Review


When it then comes to organizing the literature you reviewed, you can consider various options:

  • chronological

  • thematic

  • methodological

  • theoretical


a. Chronological order


One of the easier approaches to organize your literature is to choose a chronological order. You can then track the development of your chosen topic over time, probably starting with some "masterpieces" or key theories related to that specific topic, which would be considered elemental knowledge in that particular area, and which sometimes can be a couple of decades old, or even older. When I did my Masters, I had one literature reference dating back to the year 1776, which was The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith.


In general however, you will want to make sure that all your literature is not older than a rather shorter period of time - depending on the field and progress of your scientific area. In my case, when doing a MSc in the social sciences, I was told that the research should not be older than 7 years. However, in some areas that make fast progress, for example Artificial Intelligence, the research body is so vastly growing in a short period of time, that the time span you may consider for your review may be considerably shorter. It will be useful for you to check with your supervisor or mentor as to which time span would be expected in your case.


Go beyond simply listing and summarizing the sources in order. Analyze the patterns you see, highlight the key debates that have shaped the evolution of research in that particular field, and pay attention to limitations and gaps of the reviewed material (this is where your research will come in). Make sure you add your own interpretation of how and why the research has evolved in a certain way.


b. Thematic order


This order is helpful when you have identified some recurring key themes that are essential for your suggested research. It is also useful when bringing together various scientific areas, for example as in my case, Corporate Governance, Business Management and Performance, and Scientific Advisory Boards.


c. Methodological order


Another order when drawing your literature from different fields or disciplines often using a big variety of applied research methods is the methodological order. This allows you to then compare the results and emerging findings from different approaches, such as:

  • qualitative vs. quantitative research

  • descriptive vs. experimental

  • deductive, inductive or abductive


d. Theoretical order


In the humanities, the literature review is in general the foundation for the theoretical framework. It is then often used to discuss various theories, definitions, models or key concepts. It allows you to argue for the relevance of a specific theoretical approach and to create a framework for your research where you combine various theoretical concepts.



4. Writing the Literature Review: structure and components

Finally you get to the actual writing of your literature review in your research paper. Make sure your literature review is clearly structured, so the reader can easily follow your analysis. You will want to choose a structure similar to an essay:


A. Introduction

B. Body

C. Conclusion


A. Introduction


It is recommended to start by writing your thesis statement, i.e. a sentence that states the topic and purpose of your research. Make sure to then describe why the topic is important, e.g., because it can contribute to closing (a) known gap(s) in your particular research area.


Define the scope of the review, i.e. what aspects of the topic will be addressed, and those ones that are out of scope. Outline the search strategy you used, as well as the inclusion and exclusion criteria. In this context, you will also mention the types of sources used, as well as their date range, and the organizational pattern you chose to organize them (see chapter 3 above).


B. Body


Structure the body of your literature review in a way that you dedicate one paragraph to each different theme that is relevant for your research. Make sure you connect the various sources well and synthesize the essence of the respective research papers that are relevant for each theme. Analyze each source critically for how they contributed to the themes you are researching. Depending on which order you have chosen to organize your review (i.e. chronological, thematic, methodological or theoretical) will also determine the structure of your paragraphs. Your paragraphs could for example be structured by:

  • historical timeline (background/origin of the topic, evolution)

  • methodologies

  • mainstream versus alternative viewpoints

  • principal questions being asked

  • general conclusions being drawn


C. Conclusion


In your conclusion, you will want to make sure to point back to your thesis statement, and how you intend to answer your research question by looking at the literature you reviewed. Make sure to point to the areas where there seems to be a general consensus on presented topics, those where there is disagreement, and finally point to any gaps and limitations you have observed. You should end the literature review with your overall perspective on the topic. Especially when your literature review is an integral part of your Master or Doctoral Thesis, make sure to connect to the next chapter of your thesis, so that the reader will be inspired to read on.



5. Valuable Internet sources


It goes without saying that good quality sources can provide valuable content and/or underline the message that you are trying to convey, as is the case in this blog post, where I shared with you a possible approach of how to perform a professional Literature Review. I found the below links very helpful when researching for this blog post, and am happy to share these with you here:




Our team member Zheng is an expert in conducting literature reviews and meta analyses. Please contact us today to book a Literature Review orientation call or to request further guidance on your scientific research journey.







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