literature review word count

How To Write An A-Grade Literature Review

3 straightforward steps (with examples) + free template.

By: Derek Jansen (MBA) | Expert Reviewed By: Dr. Eunice Rautenbach | October 2019

Quality research is about building onto the existing work of others , “standing on the shoulders of giants”, as Newton put it. The literature review chapter of your dissertation, thesis or research project is where you synthesise this prior work and lay the theoretical foundation for your own research.

Long story short, this chapter is a pretty big deal, which is why you want to make sure you get it right . In this post, I’ll show you exactly how to write a literature review in three straightforward steps, so you can conquer this vital chapter (the smart way).

Overview: The Literature Review Process

• Understanding the “ why “
• Finding the relevant literature
• Cataloguing and synthesising the information
• Outlining & writing up your literature review
• Example of a literature review

But first, the “why”…

Before we unpack how to write the literature review chapter, we’ve got to look at the why . To put it bluntly, if you don’t understand the function and purpose of the literature review process, there’s no way you can pull it off well. So, what exactly is the purpose of the literature review?

Well, there are (at least) four core functions:

• For you to gain an understanding (and demonstrate this understanding) of where the research is at currently, what the key arguments and disagreements are.
• For you to identify the gap(s) in the literature and then use this as justification for your own research topic.
• To help you build a conceptual framework for empirical testing (if applicable to your research topic).
• To inform your methodological choices and help you source tried and tested questionnaires (for interviews ) and measurement instruments (for surveys ).

Most students understand the first point but don’t give any thought to the rest. To get the most from the literature review process, you must keep all four points front of mind as you review the literature (more on this shortly), or you’ll land up with a wonky foundation.

Okay – with the why out the way, let’s move on to the how . As mentioned above, writing your literature review is a process, which I’ll break down into three steps:

• Finding the most suitable literature
• Understanding , distilling and organising the literature
• Planning and writing up your literature review chapter

Importantly, you must complete steps one and two before you start writing up your chapter. I know it’s very tempting, but don’t try to kill two birds with one stone and write as you read. You’ll invariably end up wasting huge amounts of time re-writing and re-shaping, or you’ll just land up with a disjointed, hard-to-digest mess . Instead, you need to read first and distil the information, then plan and execute the writing.

Step 1: Find the relevant literature

Naturally, the first step in the literature review journey is to hunt down the existing research that’s relevant to your topic. While you probably already have a decent base of this from your research proposal , you need to expand on this substantially in the dissertation or thesis itself.

Essentially, you need to be looking for any existing literature that potentially helps you answer your research question (or develop it, if that’s not yet pinned down). There are numerous ways to find relevant literature, but I’ll cover my top four tactics here. I’d suggest combining all four methods to ensure that nothing slips past you:

Method 1 – Google Scholar Scrubbing

Google’s academic search engine, Google Scholar , is a great starting point as it provides a good high-level view of the relevant journal articles for whatever keyword you throw at it. Most valuably, it tells you how many times each article has been cited, which gives you an idea of how credible (or at least, popular) it is. Some articles will be free to access, while others will require an account, which brings us to the next method.

Method 2 – University Database Scrounging

Generally, universities provide students with access to an online library, which provides access to many (but not all) of the major journals.

So, if you find an article using Google Scholar that requires paid access (which is quite likely), search for that article in your university’s database – if it’s listed there, you’ll have access. Note that, generally, the search engine capabilities of these databases are poor, so make sure you search for the exact article name, or you might not find it.

Method 3 – Journal Article Snowballing

At the end of every academic journal article, you’ll find a list of references. As with any academic writing, these references are the building blocks of the article, so if the article is relevant to your topic, there’s a good chance a portion of the referenced works will be too. Do a quick scan of the titles and see what seems relevant, then search for the relevant ones in your university’s database.

Method 4 – Dissertation Scavenging

Similar to Method 3 above, you can leverage other students’ dissertations. All you have to do is skim through literature review chapters of existing dissertations related to your topic and you’ll find a gold mine of potential literature. Usually, your university will provide you with access to previous students’ dissertations, but you can also find a much larger selection in the following databases:

• Open Access Theses & Dissertations
• Stanford SearchWorks

Keep in mind that dissertations and theses are not as academically sound as published, peer-reviewed journal articles (because they’re written by students, not professionals), so be sure to check the credibility of any sources you find using this method. You can do this by assessing the citation count of any given article in Google Scholar. If you need help with assessing the credibility of any article, or with finding relevant research in general, you can chat with one of our Research Specialists .

Alright – with a good base of literature firmly under your belt, it’s time to move onto the next step.

Need a helping hand?

Step 2: Log, catalogue and synthesise

Once you’ve built a little treasure trove of articles, it’s time to get reading and start digesting the information – what does it all mean?

While I present steps one and two (hunting and digesting) as sequential, in reality, it’s more of a back-and-forth tango – you’ll read a little , then have an idea, spot a new citation, or a new potential variable, and then go back to searching for articles. This is perfectly natural – through the reading process, your thoughts will develop , new avenues might crop up, and directional adjustments might arise. This is, after all, one of the main purposes of the literature review process (i.e. to familiarise yourself with the current state of research in your field).

As you’re working through your treasure chest, it’s essential that you simultaneously start organising the information. There are three aspects to this:

• Logging reference information
• Building an organised catalogue
• Distilling and synthesising the information

I’ll discuss each of these below:

2.1 – Log the reference information

As you read each article, you should add it to your reference management software. I usually recommend Mendeley for this purpose (see the Mendeley 101 video below), but you can use whichever software you’re comfortable with. Most importantly, make sure you load EVERY article you read into your reference manager, even if it doesn’t seem very relevant at the time.

2.2 – Build an organised catalogue

In the beginning, you might feel confident that you can remember who said what, where, and what their main arguments were. Trust me, you won’t. If you do a thorough review of the relevant literature (as you must!), you’re going to read many, many articles, and it’s simply impossible to remember who said what, when, and in what context . Also, without the bird’s eye view that a catalogue provides, you’ll miss connections between various articles, and have no view of how the research developed over time. Simply put, it’s essential to build your own catalogue of the literature.

I would suggest using Excel to build your catalogue, as it allows you to run filters, colour code and sort – all very useful when your list grows large (which it will). How you lay your spreadsheet out is up to you, but I’d suggest you have the following columns (at minimum):

• Author, date, title – Start with three columns containing this core information. This will make it easy for you to search for titles with certain words, order research by date, or group by author.
• Categories or keywords – You can either create multiple columns, one for each category/theme and then tick the relevant categories, or you can have one column with keywords.
• Key arguments/points – Use this column to succinctly convey the essence of the article, the key arguments and implications thereof for your research.
• Context – Note the socioeconomic context in which the research was undertaken. For example, US-based, respondents aged 25-35, lower- income, etc. This will be useful for making an argument about gaps in the research.
• Methodology – Note which methodology was used and why. Also, note any issues you feel arise due to the methodology. Again, you can use this to make an argument about gaps in the research.
• Quotations – Note down any quoteworthy lines you feel might be useful later.
• Notes – Make notes about anything not already covered. For example, linkages to or disagreements with other theories, questions raised but unanswered, shortcomings or limitations, and so forth.

If you’d like, you can try out our free catalog template here (see screenshot below).

2.3 – Digest and synthesise

Most importantly, as you work through the literature and build your catalogue, you need to synthesise all the information in your own mind – how does it all fit together? Look for links between the various articles and try to develop a bigger picture view of the state of the research. Some important questions to ask yourself are:

• What answers does the existing research provide to my own research questions ?
• Which points do the researchers agree (and disagree) on?
• How has the research developed over time?
• Where do the gaps in the current research lie?

To help you develop a big-picture view and synthesise all the information, you might find mind mapping software such as Freemind useful. Alternatively, if you’re a fan of physical note-taking, investing in a large whiteboard might work for you.

Step 3: Outline and write it up!

Once you’re satisfied that you have digested and distilled all the relevant literature in your mind, it’s time to put pen to paper (or rather, fingers to keyboard). There are two steps here – outlining and writing:

3.1 – Draw up your outline

Having spent so much time reading, it might be tempting to just start writing up without a clear structure in mind. However, it’s critically important to decide on your structure and develop a detailed outline before you write anything. Your literature review chapter needs to present a clear, logical and an easy to follow narrative – and that requires some planning. Don’t try to wing it!

Naturally, you won’t always follow the plan to the letter, but without a detailed outline, you’re more than likely going to end up with a disjointed pile of waffle , and then you’re going to spend a far greater amount of time re-writing, hacking and patching. The adage, “measure twice, cut once” is very suitable here.

In terms of structure, the first decision you’ll have to make is whether you’ll lay out your review thematically (into themes) or chronologically (by date/period). The right choice depends on your topic, research objectives and research questions, which we discuss in this article .

Once that’s decided, you need to draw up an outline of your entire chapter in bullet point format. Try to get as detailed as possible, so that you know exactly what you’ll cover where, how each section will connect to the next, and how your entire argument will develop throughout the chapter. Also, at this stage, it’s a good idea to allocate rough word count limits for each section, so that you can identify word count problems before you’ve spent weeks or months writing!

PS – check out our free literature review chapter template…

3.2 – Get writing

With a detailed outline at your side, it’s time to start writing up (finally!). At this stage, it’s common to feel a bit of writer’s block and find yourself procrastinating under the pressure of finally having to put something on paper. To help with this, remember that the objective of the first draft is not perfection – it’s simply to get your thoughts out of your head and onto paper, after which you can refine them. The structure might change a little, the word count allocations might shift and shuffle, and you might add or remove a section – that’s all okay. Don’t worry about all this on your first draft – just get your thoughts down on paper.

Once you’ve got a full first draft (however rough it may be), step away from it for a day or two (longer if you can) and then come back at it with fresh eyes. Pay particular attention to the flow and narrative – does it fall fit together and flow from one section to another smoothly? Now’s the time to try to improve the linkage from each section to the next, tighten up the writing to be more concise, trim down word count and sand it down into a more digestible read.

Once you’ve done that, give your writing to a friend or colleague who is not a subject matter expert and ask them if they understand the overall discussion. The best way to assess this is to ask them to explain the chapter back to you. This technique will give you a strong indication of which points were clearly communicated and which weren’t. If you’re working with Grad Coach, this is a good time to have your Research Specialist review your chapter.

Finally, tighten it up and send it off to your supervisor for comment. Some might argue that you should be sending your work to your supervisor sooner than this (indeed your university might formally require this), but in my experience, supervisors are extremely short on time (and often patience), so, the more refined your chapter is, the less time they’ll waste on addressing basic issues (which you know about already) and the more time they’ll spend on valuable feedback that will increase your mark-earning potential.

Literature Review Example

In the video below, we unpack an actual literature review so that you can see how all the core components come together in reality.

Let’s Recap

In this post, we’ve covered how to research and write up a high-quality literature review chapter. Let’s do a quick recap of the key takeaways:

• It is essential to understand the WHY of the literature review before you read or write anything. Make sure you understand the 4 core functions of the process.
• The first step is to hunt down the relevant literature . You can do this using Google Scholar, your university database, the snowballing technique and by reviewing other dissertations and theses.
• Next, you need to log all the articles in your reference manager , build your own catalogue of literature and synthesise all the research.
• Following that, you need to develop a detailed outline of your entire chapter – the more detail the better. Don’t start writing without a clear outline (on paper, not in your head!)
• Write up your first draft in rough form – don’t aim for perfection. Remember, done beats perfect.
• Refine your second draft and get a layman’s perspective on it . Then tighten it up and submit it to your supervisor.

Psst… there’s more!

This post is an extract from our bestselling Udemy Course, Literature Review Bootcamp . If you want to work smart, you don't want to miss this .

You Might Also Like:

38 Comments

Thank you very much. This page is an eye opener and easy to comprehend.

This is awesome!

I wish I come across GradCoach earlier enough.

But all the same I’ll make use of this opportunity to the fullest.

Thank you for this good job.

Keep it up!

You’re welcome, Yinka. Thank you for the kind words. All the best writing your literature review.

Thank you for a very useful literature review session. Although I am doing most of the steps…it being my first masters an Mphil is a self study and one not sure you are on the right track. I have an amazing supervisor but one also knows they are super busy. So not wanting to bother on the minutae. Thank you.

You’re most welcome, Renee. Good luck with your literature review 🙂

This has been really helpful. Will make full use of it. 🙂

Thank you Gradcoach.

Really agreed. Admirable effort

thank you for this beautiful well explained recap.

Thank you so much for your guide of video and other instructions for the dissertation writing.

It is instrumental. It encouraged me to write a dissertation now.

Thank you the video was great – from someone that knows nothing thankyou

an amazing and very constructive way of presetting a topic, very useful, thanks for the effort,

It is timely

It is very good video of guidance for writing a research proposal and a dissertation. Since I have been watching and reading instructions, I have started my research proposal to write. I appreciate to Mr Jansen hugely.

I learn a lot from your videos. Very comprehensive and detailed.

Thank you for sharing your knowledge. As a research student, you learn better with your learning tips in research

I was really stuck in reading and gathering information but after watching these things are cleared thanks, it is so helpful.

Really helpful, Thank you for the effort in showing such information

This is super helpful thank you very much.

Thank you for this whole literature writing review.You have simplified the process.

I’m so glad I found GradCoach. Excellent information, Clear explanation, and Easy to follow, Many thanks Derek!

You’re welcome, Maithe. Good luck writing your literature review 🙂

Thank you Coach, you have greatly enriched and improved my knowledge

Great piece, so enriching and it is going to help me a great lot in my project and thesis, thanks so much

This is THE BEST site for ANYONE doing a masters or doctorate! Thank you for the sound advice and templates. You rock!

Thanks, Stephanie 🙂

This is mind blowing, the detailed explanation and simplicity is perfect.

I am doing two papers on my final year thesis, and I must stay I feel very confident to face both headlong after reading this article.

thank you so much.

if anyone is to get a paper done on time and in the best way possible, GRADCOACH is certainly the go to area!

This is very good video which is well explained with detailed explanation

Thank you excellent piece of work and great mentoring

Thanks, it was useful

Thank you very much. the video and the information were very helpful.

Good morning scholar. I’m delighted coming to know you even before the commencement of my dissertation which hopefully is expected in not more than six months from now. I would love to engage my study under your guidance from the beginning to the end. I love to know how to do good job

Thank you so much Derek for such useful information on writing up a good literature review. I am at a stage where I need to start writing my one. My proposal was accepted late last year but I honestly did not know where to start

Like the name of your YouTube implies you are GRAD (great,resource person, about dissertation). In short you are smart enough in coaching research work.

This is a very well thought out webpage. Very informative and a great read.

Very timely.

I appreciate.

Very comprehensive and eye opener for me as beginner in postgraduate study. Well explained and easy to understand. Appreciate and good reference in guiding me in my research journey. Thank you

Thank you. I requested to download the free literature review template, however, your website wouldn’t allow me to complete the request or complete a download. May I request that you email me the free template? Thank you.

Submit a Comment Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.

• Print Friendly

• Resources Home 🏠
• Try SciSpace Copilot
• Search research papers
• Add Copilot Extension
• Try AI Detector
• Try Paraphraser
• Try Citation Generator
• April Papers
• June Papers
• July Papers

How To Write A Literature Review - A Complete Guide

Table of Contents

A literature review is much more than just another section in your research paper. It forms the very foundation of your research. It is a formal piece of writing where you analyze the existing theoretical framework, principles, and assumptions and use that as a base to shape your approach to the research question.

Curating and drafting a solid literature review section not only lends more credibility to your research paper but also makes your research tighter and better focused. But, writing literature reviews is a difficult task. It requires extensive reading, plus you have to consider market trends and technological and political changes, which tend to change in the blink of an eye.

Now streamline your literature review process with the help of SciSpace Copilot. With this AI research assistant, you can efficiently synthesize and analyze a vast amount of information, identify key themes and trends, and uncover gaps in the existing research. Get real-time explanations, summaries, and answers to your questions for the paper you're reviewing, making navigating and understanding the complex literature landscape easier.

In this comprehensive guide, we will explore everything from the definition of a literature review, its appropriate length, various types of literature reviews, and how to write one.

What is a literature review?

A literature review is a collation of survey, research, critical evaluation, and assessment of the existing literature in a preferred domain.

Eminent researcher and academic Arlene Fink, in her book Conducting Research Literature Reviews , defines it as the following:

“A literature review surveys books, scholarly articles, and any other sources relevant to a particular issue, area of research, or theory, and by so doing, provides a description, summary, and critical evaluation of these works in relation to the research problem being investigated.

Literature reviews are designed to provide an overview of sources you have explored while researching a particular topic, and to demonstrate to your readers how your research fits within a larger field of study.”

Simply put, a literature review can be defined as a critical discussion of relevant pre-existing research around your research question and carving out a definitive place for your study in the existing body of knowledge. Literature reviews can be presented in multiple ways: a section of an article, the whole research paper itself, or a chapter of your thesis.

A literature review does function as a summary of sources, but it also allows you to analyze further, interpret, and examine the stated theories, methods, viewpoints, and, of course, the gaps in the existing content.

As an author, you can discuss and interpret the research question and its various aspects and debate your adopted methods to support the claim.

What is the purpose of a literature review?

A literature review is meant to help your readers understand the relevance of your research question and where it fits within the existing body of knowledge. As a researcher, you should use it to set the context, build your argument, and establish the need for your study.

What is the importance of a literature review?

The literature review is a critical part of research papers because it helps you:

• Gain an in-depth understanding of your research question and the surrounding area
• Convey that you have a thorough understanding of your research area and are up-to-date with the latest changes and advancements
• Establish how your research is connected or builds on the existing body of knowledge and how it could contribute to further research
• Elaborate on the validity and suitability of your theoretical framework and research methodology
• Identify and highlight gaps and shortcomings in the existing body of knowledge and how things need to change
• Convey to readers how your study is different or how it contributes to the research area

How long should a literature review be?

Ideally, the literature review should take up 15%-40% of the total length of your manuscript. So, if you have a 10,000-word research paper, the minimum word count could be 1500.

Your literature review format depends heavily on the kind of manuscript you are writing — an entire chapter in case of doctoral theses, a part of the introductory section in a research article, to a full-fledged review article that examines the previously published research on a topic.

Another determining factor is the type of research you are doing. The literature review section tends to be longer for secondary research projects than primary research projects.

What are the different types of literature reviews?

All literature reviews are not the same. There are a variety of possible approaches that you can take. It all depends on the type of research you are pursuing.

Here are the different types of literature reviews:

Argumentative review

It is called an argumentative review when you carefully present literature that only supports or counters a specific argument or premise to establish a viewpoint.

Integrative review

It is a type of literature review focused on building a comprehensive understanding of a topic by combining available theoretical frameworks and empirical evidence.

Methodological review

This approach delves into the ''how'' and the ''what" of the research question —  you cannot look at the outcome in isolation; you should also review the methodology used.

Systematic review

This form consists of an overview of existing evidence pertinent to a clearly formulated research question, which uses pre-specified and standardized methods to identify and critically appraise relevant research and collect, report, and analyze data from the studies included in the review.

Meta-analysis review

Meta-analysis uses statistical methods to summarize the results of independent studies. By combining information from all relevant studies, meta-analysis can provide more precise estimates of the effects than those derived from the individual studies included within a review.

Historical review

Historical literature reviews focus on examining research throughout a period, often starting with the first time an issue, concept, theory, or phenomenon emerged in the literature, then tracing its evolution within the scholarship of a discipline. The purpose is to place research in a historical context to show familiarity with state-of-the-art developments and identify future research's likely directions.

Theoretical Review

This form aims to examine the corpus of theory accumulated regarding an issue, concept, theory, and phenomenon. The theoretical literature review helps to establish what theories exist, the relationships between them, the degree the existing approaches have been investigated, and to develop new hypotheses to be tested.

Scoping Review

The Scoping Review is often used at the beginning of an article, dissertation, or research proposal. It is conducted before the research to highlight gaps in the existing body of knowledge and explains why the project should be greenlit.

State-of-the-Art Review

The State-of-the-Art review is conducted periodically, focusing on the most recent research. It describes what is currently known, understood, or agreed upon regarding the research topic and highlights where there are still disagreements.

Can you use the first person in a literature review?

When writing literature reviews, you should avoid the usage of first-person pronouns. It means that instead of "I argue that" or "we argue that," the appropriate expression would be "this research paper argues that."

Do you need an abstract for a literature review?

Ideally, yes. It is always good to have a condensed summary that is self-contained and independent of the rest of your review. As for how to draft one, you can follow the same fundamental idea when preparing an abstract for a literature review. It should also include:

• The research topic and your motivation behind selecting it
• A one-sentence thesis statement
• An explanation of the kinds of literature featured in the review
• Summary of what you've learned
• Conclusions you drew from the literature you reviewed
• Potential implications and future scope for research

Here's an example of the abstract of a literature review

Is a literature review written in the past tense?

Yes, the literature review should ideally be written in the past tense. You should not use the present or future tense when writing one. The exceptions are when you have statements describing events that happened earlier than the literature you are reviewing or events that are currently occurring; then, you can use the past perfect or present perfect tenses.

How many sources for a literature review?

There are multiple approaches to deciding how many sources to include in a literature review section. The first approach would be to look level you are at as a researcher. For instance, a doctoral thesis might need 60+ sources. In contrast, you might only need to refer to 5-15 sources at the undergraduate level.

The second approach is based on the kind of literature review you are doing — whether it is merely a chapter of your paper or if it is a self-contained paper in itself. When it is just a chapter, sources should equal the total number of pages in your article's body. In the second scenario, you need at least three times as many sources as there are pages in your work.

Quick tips on how to write a literature review

To know how to write a literature review, you must clearly understand its impact and role in establishing your work as substantive research material.

You need to follow the below-mentioned steps, to write a literature review:

• Outline the purpose behind the literature review
• Search relevant literature
• Examine and assess the relevant resources
• Discover connections by drawing deep insights from the resources
• Structure planning to write a good literature review

1. Outline and identify the purpose of  a literature review

As a first step on how to write a literature review, you must know what the research question or topic is and what shape you want your literature review to take. Ensure you understand the research topic inside out, or else seek clarifications. You must be able to the answer below questions before you start:

• How many sources do I need to include?
• What kind of sources should I analyze?
• How much should I critically evaluate each source?
• Should I summarize, synthesize or offer a critique of the sources?
• Do I need to include any background information or definitions?

Additionally, you should know that the narrower your research topic is, the swifter it will be for you to restrict the number of sources to be analyzed.

2. Search relevant literature

Dig deeper into search engines to discover what has already been published around your chosen topic. Make sure you thoroughly go through appropriate reference sources like books, reports, journal articles, government docs, and web-based resources.

You must prepare a list of keywords and their different variations. You can start your search from any library’s catalog, provided you are an active member of that institution. The exact keywords can be extended to widen your research over other databases and academic search engines like:

• Google Scholar
• Microsoft Academic
• Science.gov

Besides, it is not advisable to go through every resource word by word. Alternatively, what you can do is you can start by reading the abstract and then decide whether that source is relevant to your research or not.

Additionally, you must spend surplus time assessing the quality and relevance of resources. It would help if you tried preparing a list of citations to ensure that there lies no repetition of authors, publications, or articles in the literature review.

3. Examine and assess the sources

It is nearly impossible for you to go through every detail in the research article. So rather than trying to fetch every detail, you have to analyze and decide which research sources resemble closest and appear relevant to your chosen domain.

While analyzing the sources, you should look to find out answers to questions like:

• What question or problem has the author been describing and debating?
• What is the definition of critical aspects?
• How well the theories, approach, and methodology have been explained?
• Whether the research theory used some conventional or new innovative approach?
• How relevant are the key findings of the work?
• In what ways does it relate to other sources on the same topic?
• What challenges does this research paper pose to the existing theory
• What are the possible contributions or benefits it adds to the subject domain?

Be always mindful that you refer only to credible and authentic resources. It would be best if you always take references from different publications to validate your theory.

Always keep track of important information or data you can present in your literature review right from the beginning. It will help steer your path from any threats of plagiarism and also make it easier to curate an annotated bibliography or reference section.

4. Discover connections

At this stage, you must start deciding on the argument and structure of your literature review. To accomplish this, you must discover and identify the relations and connections between various resources while drafting your abstract.

A few aspects that you should be aware of while writing a literature review include:

• Rise to prominence: Theories and methods that have gained reputation and supporters over time.
• Constant scrutiny: Concepts or theories that repeatedly went under examination.
• Contradictions and conflicts: Theories, both the supporting and the contradictory ones, for the research topic.
• Knowledge gaps: What exactly does it fail to address, and how to bridge them with further research?
• Influential resources: Significant research projects available that have been upheld as milestones or perhaps, something that can modify the current trends

Once you join the dots between various past research works, it will be easier for you to draw a conclusion and identify your contribution to the existing knowledge base.

5. Structure planning to write a good literature review

There exist different ways towards planning and executing the structure of a literature review. The format of a literature review varies and depends upon the length of the research.

Like any other research paper, the literature review format must contain three sections: introduction, body, and conclusion. The goals and objectives of the research question determine what goes inside these three sections.

Nevertheless, a good literature review can be structured according to the chronological, thematic, methodological, or theoretical framework approach.

Literature review samples

1. Standalone

2. As a section of a research paper

How SciSpace Discover makes literature review a breeze?

SciSpace Discover is a one-stop solution to do an effective literature search and get barrier-free access to scientific knowledge. It is an excellent repository where you can find millions of only peer-reviewed articles and full-text PDF files. Here’s more on how you can use it:

Find the right information

Find what you want quickly and easily with comprehensive search filters that let you narrow down papers according to PDF availability, year of publishing, document type, and affiliated institution. Moreover, you can sort the results based on the publishing date, citation count, and relevance.

Assess credibility of papers quickly

When doing the literature review, it is critical to establish the quality of your sources. They form the foundation of your research. SciSpace Discover helps you assess the quality of a source by providing an overview of its references, citations, and performance metrics.

Get the complete picture in no time

SciSpace Discover’s personalized suggestion engine helps you stay on course and get the complete picture of the topic from one place. Every time you visit an article page, it provides you links to related papers. Besides that, it helps you understand what’s trending, who are the top authors, and who are the leading publishers on a topic.

Make referring sources super easy

To ensure you don't lose track of your sources, you must start noting down your references when doing the literature review. SciSpace Discover makes this step effortless. Click the 'cite' button on an article page, and you will receive preloaded citation text in multiple styles — all you've to do is copy-paste it into your manuscript.

Final tips on how to write a literature review

A massive chunk of time and effort is required to write a good literature review. But, if you go about it systematically, you'll be able to save a ton of time and build a solid foundation for your research.

We hope this guide has helped you answer several key questions you have about writing literature reviews.

Would you like to explore SciSpace Discover and kick off your literature search right away? You can get started here .

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

1. how to start a literature review.

• What questions do you want to answer?

• What sources do you need to answer these questions?

• What information do these sources contain?

• How can you use this information to answer your questions?

2. What to include in a literature review?

• A brief background of the problem or issue

• What has previously been done to address the problem or issue

• A description of what you will do in your project

• How this study will contribute to research on the subject

3. Why literature review is important?

The literature review is an important part of any research project because it allows the writer to look at previous studies on a topic and determine existing gaps in the literature, as well as what has already been done. It will also help them to choose the most appropriate method for their own study.

4. How to cite a literature review in APA format?

To cite a literature review in APA style, you need to provide the author's name, the title of the article, and the year of publication. For example: Patel, A. B., & Stokes, G. S. (2012). The relationship between personality and intelligence: A meta-analysis of longitudinal research. Personality and Individual Differences, 53(1), 16-21

5. What are the components of a literature review?

• A brief introduction to the topic, including its background and context. The introduction should also include a rationale for why the study is being conducted and what it will accomplish.

• A description of the methodologies used in the study. This can include information about data collection methods, sample size, and statistical analyses.

• A presentation of the findings in an organized format that helps readers follow along with the author's conclusions.

6. What are common errors in writing literature review?

• Not spending enough time to critically evaluate the relevance of resources, observations and conclusions.

• Totally relying on secondary data while ignoring primary data.

• Letting your personal bias seep into your interpretation of existing literature.

• No detailed explanation of the procedure to discover and identify an appropriate literature review.

7. What are the 5 C's of writing literature review?

• Cite - the sources you utilized and referenced in your research.

• Compare - existing arguments, hypotheses, methodologies, and conclusions found in the knowledge base.

• Contrast - the arguments, topics, methodologies, approaches, and disputes that may be found in the literature.

• Critique - the literature and describe the ideas and opinions you find more convincing and why.

• Connect - the various studies you reviewed in your research.

8. How many sources should a literature review have?

When it is just a chapter, sources should equal the total number of pages in your article's body. if it is a self-contained paper in itself, you need at least three times as many sources as there are pages in your work.

9. Can literature review have diagrams?

• To represent an abstract idea or concept

• To explain the steps of a process or procedure

• To help readers understand the relationships between different concepts

10. How old should sources be in a literature review?

Sources for a literature review should be as current as possible or not older than ten years. The only exception to this rule is if you are reviewing a historical topic and need to use older sources.

11. What are the types of literature review?

• Argumentative review

• Integrative review

• Methodological review

• Systematic review

• Meta-analysis review

• Historical review

• Theoretical review

• Scoping review

• State-of-the-Art review

12. Is a literature review mandatory?

Yes. Literature review is a mandatory part of any research project. It is a critical step in the process that allows you to establish the scope of your research, and provide a background for the rest of your work.

But before you go,

• Six Online Tools for Easy Literature Review
• Evaluating literature review: systematic vs. scoping reviews
• Systematic Approaches to a Successful Literature Review
• Writing Integrative Literature Reviews: Guidelines and Examples

You might also like

Consensus GPT vs. SciSpace GPT: Choose the Best GPT for Research

Literature Review and Theoretical Framework: Understanding the Differences

Types of Essays in Academic Writing

• Undergraduate courses
• Postgraduate courses
• January starts
• Foundation courses
• Apprenticeships
• Part-time and short courses
• Apply undergraduate
• Apply postgraduate

Search for a course

Search by course name, subject, and more

• Undergraduate
• Postgraduate
• (suspended) - Available in Clearing Not available in Clearing location-sign UCAS

Fees and funding

• Tuition fees
• Scholarships
• Funding your studies
• Student finance
• Cost of living support

Why study at Kent

Student life.

• Careers and employability
• Student support and wellbeing
• Our locations
• Placements and internships
• Year abroad
• Student stories
• Schools and colleges
• International
• International students
• Your country
• Applicant FAQs
• International scholarships
• University of Kent International College
• Campus Tours
• Applicant Events
• Postgraduate events
• Maps and directions
• Research strengths
• Research centres
• Research impact

Research institutes

• Durrell Institute of Conservation and Ecology
• Institute of Cyber Security for Society
• Institute of Cultural and Creative Industries
• Institute of Health, Social Care and Wellbeing

Research students

• Graduate and Researcher College
• Research degrees
• Find a supervisor
• How to apply

Popular searches

• Visits and Open Days
• Jobs and vacancies
• Accommodation
• Student guide
• Library and IT
• Research highlights
• Signature themes
• Partner with us
• Student Guide
• Student Help
• Health & wellbeing
• Student voice
• Living at Kent
• Careers & volunteering
• Diversity at Kent
• Finance & funding
• Life after graduation

Literature reviews

Writing a literature review.

The following guide has been created for you by the  Student Learning Advisory Service . For more detailed guidance and to speak to one of our advisers, please book an  appointment  or join one of our  workshops . Alternatively, have a look at our  SkillBuilder  skills videos.   

Preparing a literature review involves:

• Searching for reliable, accurate and up-to-date material on a topic or subject
• Reading and summarising the key points from this literature
• Synthesising these key ideas, theories and concepts into a summary of what is known
• Discussing and evaluating these ideas, theories and concepts
• Identifying particular areas of debate or controversy
• Preparing the ground for the application of these ideas to new research

Finding and choosing material

Ensure you are clear on what you are looking for. ask yourself:.

• What is the specific question, topic or focus of my assignment?
• What kind of material do I need (e.g. theory, policy, empirical data)?
• What type of literature is available (e.g. journals, books, government documents)?

What kind of literature is particularly authoritative in this academic discipline (e.g. psychology, sociology, pharmacy)?

How much do you need?

This will depend on the length of the dissertation, the nature of the subject, and the level of study (undergraduate, Masters, PhD). As a very rough rule of thumb – you may choose 8-10 significant pieces (books and/or articles) for an 8,000 word dissertation, up to 20 major pieces of work for 12-15,000 words, and so on. Bear in mind that if your dissertation is based mainly around an interaction with existing scholarship you will need a longer literature review than if it is there as a prelude to new empirical research. Use your judgement or ask your supervisor for guidance.

Where to find suitable material

Your literature review should include a balance between substantial academic books, journal articles and other scholarly publications. All these sources should be as up-to-date as possible, with the exception of ‘classic texts’ such as major works written by leading scholars setting out formative ideas and theories central to your subject. There are several ways to locate suitable material:

Module bibliography: for undergraduate dissertations, look first at the bibliography provided with the module documentation. Choose one or two likely looking books or articles and then scan through the bibliographies provided by these authors. Skim read some of this material looking for clues: can you use these leads to identify key theories and authors or track down other appropriate material?

Library catalogue search engine: enter a few key words to capture a range of items, but avoid over-generalisations; if you type in something as broad as ‘social theory’ you are likely to get several thousand results. Be more specific: for example, ‘Heidegger, existentialism’. Ideally, you should narrow the field to obtain just a few dozen results. Skim through these quickly to identity texts which are most likely to contribute to your study.

Library bookshelves: browse the library shelves in the relevant subject area and examine the books that catch your eye. Check the contents and index pages, or skim through the introductions (or abstracts, in the case of journal articles) to see if they contain relevant material, and replace them if not. Don’t be afraid to ask one of the subject librarians for further help. Your supervisor may also be able to point you in the direction of some of the important literature , but remember this is your literature search, not theirs.

Online: for recent journal articles you will almost certainly need to use one of the online search engines. These can be found on the ‘Indexing Services’ button on the Templeman Library website. Kent students based at Medway still need to use the Templeman pages to access online journals, although you can get to these pages through the Drill Hall Library catalogue. Take a look as well at the Subject Guides on both the Templeman and DHL websites.

Check that you have made the right selection by asking:

• Has my search been wide enough to ensure that I have identified all the relevant material, but narrow enough to exclude irrelevant material?
• Is there a good enough sample of literature for the level (PhD, Masters, undergraduate) of my dissertation or thesis?
• Have I considered as many alternative points of view as possible?
• Will the reader find my literature review relevant and useful?

Assessing the literature

Read the material you have chosen carefully, considering the following:

• The key point discussed by the author: is this clearly defined
• What evidence has the author produced to support this central idea?
• How convincing are the reasons given for the author’s point of view?
• Could the evidence be interpreted in other ways?
• What is the author's research method (e.g. qualitative, quantitative, experimental, etc.)?
• What is the author's theoretical framework (e.g. psychological, developmental, feminist)?
• What is the relationship assumed by the author between theory and practice?
• Has the author critically evaluated the other literature in the field?
• Does the author include literature opposing their point of view?
• Is the research data based on a reliable method and accurate information?
• Can you ‘deconstruct’ the argument – identify the gaps or jumps in the logic?
• What are the strengths and limitations of this study?
• What does this book or article contribute to the field or topic?
• What does this book or article contribute to my own topic or thesis?

As you note down the key content of each book or journal article (together with the reference details of each source) record your responses to these questions. You will then be able to summarise each piece of material from two perspectives:     

Content: a brief description of the content of the book or article. Remember, an author will often make just one key point; so, what is the point they are making, and how does it relate to your own research project or assignment?

Critical analysis: an assessment of the relative strengths and weaknesses of the evidence used, and the arguments presented. Has anything conveniently been left out or skated over? Is there a counter-argument, and has the author dealt with this adequately? Can the evidence presented be interpreted another way? Does the author demonstrate any obvious bias which could affect their reliability? Overall, based on the above analysis of the author’s work, how do you evaluate its contribution to the scholarly understanding and knowledge surrounding the topic?    

Structuring the literature review

In a PhD thesis, the literature review typically comprises one chapter (perhaps 8-10,000 words), for a Masters dissertation it may be around 2-3,000 words, and for an undergraduate dissertation it may be no more than 2,000 words. In each case the word count can vary depending on a range of factors and it is always best, if in doubt, to ask your supervisor.

The overall structure of the section or chapter should be like any other: it should have a beginning, middle and end. You will need to guide the reader through the literature review, outlining the strategy you have adopted for selecting the books or articles, presenting the topic theme for the review, then using most of the word limit to analyse the chosen books or articles thoroughly before pulling everything together briefly in the conclusion.

Some people prefer a less linear approach. Instead of simply working through a list of 8-20 items on your book review list, you might want to try a thematic approach, grouping key ideas, facts, concepts or approaches together and then bouncing the ideas off each other. This is a slightly more creative (and interesting) way of producing the review, but a little more risky as it is harder to establish coherence and logical sequencing.

Whichever approach you adopt, make sure everything flows smoothly – that one idea or book leads neatly to the next. Take your reader effortlessly through a sequence of thought that is clear, accurate, precise and interesting. 

Writing up your literature review

As with essays generally, only attempt to write up the literature review when you have completed all the reading and note-taking, and carefully planned its content and structure. Find an appropriate way of introducing the review, then guide the reader through the material clearly and directly, bearing in mind the following:

• Be selective in the number of points you draw out from each piece of literature; remember that one of your objectives is to demonstrate that you can use your judgement to identify what is central and what is secondary.
• Summarise and synthesise – use your own words to sum up what you think is important or controversial about the book or article.
• Never claim more than the evidence will support. Too many dissertations and theses are let down by sweeping generalisations. Be tentative and careful in the way you interpret the evidence.
• Keep your own voice – you are entitled to your own point of view provided it is based on evidence and clear argument.
• At the same time, aim to project an objective and tentative tone by using the 3rd person, (for example, ‘this tends to suggest’, ‘it could be argued’ and so on).
• Even with a literature review you should avoid using too many, or overlong, quotes. Summarise material in your own words as much as possible. Save the quotes for ‘punch-lines’ to drive a particular point home.
• Revise, revise, revise: refine and edit the draft as much as you can. Check for fluency, structure, evidence, criticality and referencing, and don’t forget the basics of good grammar, punctuation and spelling.

• Link to facebook
• Link to linkedin
• Link to twitter
• Link to youtube
• Writing Tips

How Long Should a Literature Review Be?

4-minute read

• 7th October 2023

If you’re writing a research paper or dissertation , then you know how important it is to include a thorough, comprehensive literature review. But exactly how long should your literature review be in relation to the rest of your work? While there’s no one-size-fits-all answer to that question, there are some factors that will help determine the length of your review. In this post, we’ll discuss what information to include in your literature review and how long it should be.

Keep reading to learn more.

What Is a Literature Review?

A literature review is a critical summary and evaluation of the current resources (e.g., books and journal articles) on a specific topic or research question. It is a crucial part of academic writing, such as dissertations, in all categories and fields. Essentially, literature reviews help contextualize your investigations and show how your work is building on existing research.

No matter how long your literature review is, it should generally:

●  Establish context for your research (i.e., provide relevant background information so your reader understands the historical significance of your study ).

●  Identify gaps in the existing literature (such as unaddressed questions or aspects of your topic).

●  Highlight significant concepts related to your topic.

●  Cite relevant studies.

●  Support your argument.

It’s also essential that a literature review critically analyze the sources cited in your study, considering factors such as sample size, research design, and potential biases. Be sure to structure your literature review using the same referencing style as the rest of your research paper (e.g., APA , Chicago , MLA ).

Find this useful?

Subscribe to our newsletter and get writing tips from our editors straight to your inbox.

The length of your literature review depends on several factors, including the scope and purpose of your research. In general, the length of the review should be proportionate to your overall paper. For example, if you’re writing a fifty-thousand-word dissertation, then your literature review will likely be an entire chapter comprising about 20 pages. If it’s for a 15-page research paper, your literature review may only be a few pages.

Here are several factors that could affect the length of your literature review:

●  Institutional guidelines : Always check the guidelines provided by your institution or journal (such as an APA journal ). There may be a specific length or word count required for publication.

●  Scope : If your research topic is narrow and focused, your literature review may be shorter. Conversely, if your topic is broad and encompasses a large body of literature, your review may need to be longer.

●  Field of study : Different academic fields may have different expectations regarding the length of literature reviews. For example, literature reviews in the humanities might be longer than those in the natural sciences.

Also, consider your audience. If your literature review is for a general audience or a class assignment, it can probably be shorter and less specialized. However, if it’s for an academic audience in your field of study, you may need to be more thorough and provide an extensive review of the existing literature.

Most literature reviews follow the same basic structure of an introduction, body, and conclusion. Most of the time, they are part of a larger work, so the introduction and conclusion paragraphs will be relatively brief.

However, if the review is a standalone piece, then your introduction and conclusion will be longer since you will need to discuss your research objectives, methods, and findings as well as analyze the literature used in your study.

To ensure your literature review makes an impression, have it professionally proofread by our expert literature review editing services . Submit your free sample of 500 words or less to get started today!

Share this article:

Post A New Comment

Got content that needs a quick turnaround? Let us polish your work. Explore our editorial business services.

3-minute read

The 5 Best Ecommerce Website Design Tools 

A visually appealing and user-friendly website is essential for success in today’s competitive ecommerce landscape....

The 7 Best Market Research Tools in 2024

Market research is the backbone of successful marketing strategies. To gain a competitive edge, businesses...

Google Patents: Tutorial and Guide

Google Patents is a valuable resource for anyone who wants to learn more about patents, whether...

How to Come Up With Newsletter Ideas

If used strategically, email can have a substantial impact on your business. In fact, according...

Free Online Peer Review Template

Having your writing peer-reviewed is a valuable process that can showcase the strengths and weaknesses...

How to Embed a Video in PowerPoint

Including a video in your PowerPoint presentation can make it more exciting and engaging. And...

Make sure your writing is the best it can be with our expert English proofreading and editing.

Have a language expert improve your writing

Run a free plagiarism check in 10 minutes, generate accurate citations for free.

• Knowledge Base

Methodology

• How to Write a Literature Review | Guide, Examples, & Templates

How to Write a Literature Review | Guide, Examples, & Templates

Published on January 2, 2023 by Shona McCombes . Revised on September 11, 2023.

What is a literature review? A literature review is a survey of scholarly sources on a specific topic. It provides an overview of current knowledge, allowing you to identify relevant theories, methods, and gaps in the existing research that you can later apply to your paper, thesis, or dissertation topic .

There are five key steps to writing a literature review:

• Search for relevant literature
• Evaluate sources
• Identify themes, debates, and gaps
• Outline the structure
• Write your literature review

A good literature review doesn’t just summarize sources—it analyzes, synthesizes , and critically evaluates to give a clear picture of the state of knowledge on the subject.

Instantly correct all language mistakes in your text

Upload your document to correct all your mistakes in minutes

Table of contents

What is the purpose of a literature review, 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, free lecture slides, other interesting articles, frequently asked questions, introduction.

• Quick Run-through
• Step 1 & 2

When you write a thesis , dissertation , or research paper , you will likely have to conduct a literature review to situate your research within existing knowledge. The literature review gives you a chance to:

• Demonstrate your familiarity with the topic and its scholarly context
• Develop a theoretical framework and methodology for your research
• Position your work in relation to other researchers and theorists
• Show how your research addresses a gap or contributes to a debate
• Evaluate the current state of research and demonstrate your knowledge of the scholarly debates around your topic.

Writing literature reviews is a particularly important skill if you want to apply for graduate school or pursue a career in research. We’ve written a step-by-step guide that you can follow below.

The only proofreading tool specialized in correcting academic writing - try for free!

The academic proofreading tool has been trained on 1000s of academic texts and by native English editors. Making it the most accurate and reliable proofreading tool for students.

Try for free

Writing literature reviews can be quite challenging! A good starting point could be to look at some examples, depending on what kind of literature review you’d like to write.

• Example literature review #1: “Why Do People Migrate? A Review of the Theoretical Literature” ( Theoretical literature review about the development of economic migration theory from the 1950s to today.)
• Example literature review #2: “Literature review as a research methodology: An overview and guidelines” ( Methodological literature review about interdisciplinary knowledge acquisition and production.)
• Example literature review #3: “The Use of Technology in English Language Learning: A Literature Review” ( Thematic literature review about the effects of technology on language acquisition.)
• Example literature review #4: “Learners’ Listening Comprehension Difficulties in English Language Learning: A Literature Review” ( Chronological literature review about how the concept of listening skills has changed over time.)

You can also check out our templates with literature review examples and sample outlines at the links below.

Download Word doc Download Google doc

Before you begin searching for literature, you need a clearly defined topic .

If you are writing the literature review section of a dissertation or research paper, you will search for literature related to your research problem and questions .

Make a list of keywords

Start by creating a list of keywords related to your research question. Include each of the key concepts or variables you’re interested in, and list any synonyms and related terms. You can add to this list as you discover new keywords in the process of your literature search.

• Social media, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, TikTok
• Body image, self-perception, self-esteem, mental health
• Generation Z, teenagers, adolescents, youth

Search for relevant sources

Use your keywords to begin searching for sources. Some useful databases to search for journals and articles include:

• Your university’s library catalogue
• Google Scholar
• Project Muse (humanities and social sciences)
• Medline (life sciences and biomedicine)
• EconLit (economics)
• Inspec (physics, engineering and computer science)

You can also use boolean operators to help narrow down your search.

Make sure to read the abstract to find out whether an article is relevant to your question. When you find a useful book or article, you can check the bibliography to find other relevant sources.

You likely won’t be able to read absolutely everything that has been written on your topic, so it will be necessary to evaluate which sources are most relevant to your research question.

For each publication, ask yourself:

• What question or problem is the author addressing?
• What are the key concepts and how are they defined?
• What are the key theories, models, and methods?
• Does the research use established frameworks or take an innovative approach?
• What are the results and conclusions of the study?
• How does the publication relate to other literature in the field? Does it confirm, add to, or challenge established knowledge?
• What are the strengths and weaknesses of the research?

Make sure the sources you use are credible , and make sure you read any landmark studies and major theories in your field of research.

You can use our template to summarize and evaluate sources you’re thinking about using. Click on either button below to download.

Take notes and cite your sources

As you read, you should also begin the writing process. Take notes that you can later incorporate into the text of your literature review.

It is important to keep track of your sources with citations to avoid plagiarism . It can be helpful to make an annotated bibliography , where you compile full citation information and write a paragraph of summary and analysis for each source. This helps you remember what you read and saves time later in the process.

Receive feedback on language, structure, and formatting

Professional editors proofread and edit your paper by focusing on:

• Academic style
• Vague sentences
• Style consistency

See an example

To begin organizing your literature review’s argument and structure, be sure you understand the connections and relationships between the sources you’ve read. Based on your reading and notes, you can look for:

• Trends and patterns (in theory, method or results): do certain approaches become more or less popular over time?
• Themes: what questions or concepts recur across the literature?
• Debates, conflicts and contradictions: where do sources disagree?
• Pivotal publications: are there any influential theories or studies that changed the direction of the field?
• Gaps: what is missing from the literature? Are there weaknesses that need to be addressed?

This step will help you work out the structure of your literature review and (if applicable) show how your own research will contribute to existing knowledge.

• Most research has focused on young women.
• There is an increasing interest in the visual aspects of social media.
• But there is still a lack of robust research on highly visual platforms like Instagram and Snapchat—this is a gap that you could address in your own research.

There are various approaches to organizing the body of a literature review. Depending on the length of your literature review, you can combine several of these strategies (for example, your overall structure might be thematic, but each theme is discussed chronologically).

Chronological

The simplest approach is to trace the development of the topic over time. However, if you choose this strategy, be careful to avoid simply listing and summarizing sources in order.

Try to analyze patterns, turning points and key debates that have shaped the direction of the field. Give your interpretation of how and why certain developments occurred.

If you have found some recurring central themes, you can organize your literature review into subsections that address different aspects of the topic.

For example, if you are reviewing literature about inequalities in migrant health outcomes, key themes might include healthcare policy, language barriers, cultural attitudes, legal status, and economic access.

Methodological

If you draw your sources from different disciplines or fields that use a variety of research methods , you might want to compare the results and conclusions that emerge from different approaches. For example:

• Look at what results have emerged in qualitative versus quantitative research
• Discuss how the topic has been approached by empirical versus theoretical scholarship
• Divide the literature into sociological, historical, and cultural sources

Theoretical

A literature review is often the foundation for a theoretical framework . You can use it to discuss various theories, models, and definitions of key concepts.

You might argue for the relevance of a specific theoretical approach, or combine various theoretical concepts to create a framework for your research.

Like any other academic text , your literature review should have an introduction , a main body, and a conclusion . What you include in each depends on the objective of your literature review.

The introduction should clearly establish the focus and purpose of the literature review.

Depending on the length of your literature review, you might want to divide the body into subsections. You can use a subheading for each theme, time period, or methodological approach.

As you write, you can follow these tips:

• Summarize and synthesize: give an overview of the main points of each source and combine them into a coherent whole
• Analyze and interpret: don’t just paraphrase other researchers — add your own interpretations where possible, discussing the significance of findings in relation to the literature as a whole
• Critically evaluate: mention the strengths and weaknesses of your sources
• Write in well-structured paragraphs: use transition words and topic sentences to draw connections, comparisons and contrasts

In the conclusion, you should summarize the key findings you have taken from the literature and emphasize their significance.

When you’ve finished writing and revising your literature review, don’t forget to proofread thoroughly before submitting. Not a language expert? Check out Scribbr’s professional proofreading services !

This article has been adapted into lecture slides that you can use to teach your students about writing a literature review.

Scribbr slides are free to use, customize, and distribute for educational purposes.

Open Google Slides Download PowerPoint

If you want to know more about the research process , methodology , research bias , or statistics , make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples.

• Sampling methods
• Simple random sampling
• Stratified sampling
• Cluster sampling
• Likert scales
• Reproducibility

 Statistics

• Null hypothesis
• Statistical power
• Probability distribution
• Effect size
• Poisson distribution

Research bias

• Optimism bias
• Cognitive bias
• Implicit bias
• Hawthorne effect
• Anchoring bias
• Explicit bias

A literature review is a survey of scholarly sources (such as books, journal articles, and theses) related to a specific topic or research question .

It is often written as part of a thesis, dissertation , or research paper , in order to situate your work in relation to existing knowledge.

There are several reasons to conduct a literature review at the beginning of a research project:

• To familiarize yourself with the current state of knowledge on your topic
• To ensure that you’re not just repeating what others have already done
• To identify gaps in knowledge and unresolved problems that your research can address
• To develop your theoretical framework and methodology
• To provide an overview of the key findings and debates on the topic

Writing the literature review shows your reader how your work relates to existing research and what new insights it will contribute.

The literature review usually comes near the beginning of your thesis or dissertation . After the introduction , it grounds your research in a scholarly field and leads directly to your theoretical framework or methodology .

A literature review is a survey of credible sources on a topic, often used in dissertations , theses, and research papers . Literature reviews give an overview of knowledge on a subject, helping you identify relevant theories and methods, as well as gaps in existing research. Literature reviews are set up similarly to other  academic texts , with an introduction , a main body, and a conclusion .

An  annotated bibliography is a list of  source references that has a short description (called an annotation ) for each of the sources. It is often assigned as part of the research process for a  paper .  

Cite this Scribbr article

If you want to cite this source, you can copy and paste the citation or click the “Cite this Scribbr article” button to automatically add the citation to our free Citation Generator.

McCombes, S. (2023, September 11). How to Write a Literature Review | Guide, Examples, & Templates. Scribbr. Retrieved March 12, 2024, from https://www.scribbr.com/dissertation/literature-review/

Is this article helpful?

Shona McCombes

Other students also liked, what is a theoretical framework | guide to organizing, what is a research methodology | steps & tips, how to write a research proposal | examples & templates, what is your plagiarism score.

Literature reviews

• Starting your literature review
• Introduction

Structuring your reading

When to stop reading, how to organise a literature review, writing your literature review.

• Developing your literature review
• Writing systematic reviews

Useful links for literature reviews

• Study Advice Helping students to achieve study success with guides, video tutorials, seminars and one-to-one advice sessions.

• Doing your literature review (video) Watch this brief video tutorial for more on the topic.
• Doing your literature review (transcript) Read along while watching the video tutorial.
• Literature searching guide A guide to finding articles, books and other materials on your subject
• Doing your literature search video - University of Reading Brief video on literature searching from our Academic Liaison Librarians.
• Royal Literary Fund: Writing a Literature Review A guide to writing literature reviews from the Royal Literary Fund
• What it means to be a critical student A brief and very useful video tutorial from the University of Leicester.
• Reading and notemaking LibGuide Expert guidance on managing your reading and making effective notes.
• Dissertations and major projects LibGuide Expert guidance on planning, researching and writing dissertations and major projects.

If you have thought about the areas you need to research and have conducted some searches for literature, you should be ready to set down some draft topic headings to structure your literature review.

Select one of your headings and choose a few key texts to read first - three is ideal to start with. Remember that you may eventually be writing about the same text under different headings, so bear that in mind when you are reading and making notes.

When you have finished reading your chosen texts, write a draft section summarising and commenting on what you have read, taking special care to show how it is relevant to your research. Then look to see what you need to discuss further, and do more reading to enable you to plug the gaps.

Try to set limits on how long you will spend reading. Then plan backwards from your deadline and decide when you need to move on to other parts of your investigation e.g. gathering the data.

You need to show you have read the major and important texts in your topic, and that you have also explored the most up-to-date research. If you have demonstrated both of these, you are on the right lines.

If you keep coming across very similar viewpoints and your reading is no longer providing new information, this is a sign you have reached saturation point and should probably stop.

Be guided by your research questions. When reading, ask yourself, "How does this relate to my investigation?" If you are going off into unrelated areas, stop reading and refocus on your topic.

Another thing you can do is to group what you have read into different topics or themes . These can provide useful headings when you come to write up your literature review. Use different coloured highlighters to identify which topic or heading each article fits into.

Be selective - you don't have to include everything you have read in your literature review. Only include research which is relevant and which helps you understand more about your own investigation. What you leave out won't be wasted as it helped you refine your understanding of the wider issues and identify what was relevant to your own investigation.

You don't have to refer to everything in the same depth in your literature review. You are usually expected to prioritise recent research. Some scientific research that was crucial in the past is now out of date. For instance, there may be a few older studies that were important in starting research in the field, but their methods have been surpassed by more accurate methods. You only need to demonstrate your awareness of these older, dated studies in a few sentences, then move on to discussing in greater depth the up-to-date methods and why they are more accurate.

Like an essay, a literature review has an introduction, main body, and conclusion.

Introduction : This explains the broad context of your research area and the main topics you are investigating. It briefly highlights the relevant issues or debates that have characterised your field of research.

It should also include some signposting for the reader, explaining the organisation / sequence of topics covered, and the scope of your survey.

Main body : An analysis of the literature according to a number of themes or topics that overlap with your research. It may have headings.

You can write your literature review one section at a time, but make sure you read through them all to check they link together and tell a coherent "story".

This should show how your research builds on what has been done before. Based on previous research, you provide justifications for what you are doing, why you are doing it, and how you are going to do it.

Conclusion : This should summarise the current state of the research in your field as analysed in the main body. It should identify any gaps or problems with the existing research, and explain how your investigation is going to address these gaps or build on the existing research.

• The structure of a literature review (Royal Literary Fund) Guidance on structuring a literature review.
• << Previous: Starting your literature review
• Next: Developing your literature review >>
• Last Updated: Jan 29, 2024 11:27 AM
• URL: https://libguides.reading.ac.uk/literaturereview

Find what you need to study

Academic Paper: Literature Review

7 min read • march 13, 2023

Dylan Black

Introduction

Your Literature Review is the first formal part of your paper. It is the section that is the most detached from your actual research project because you most likely will not bring up your actual research question/topic until the end when you situate your gap in the body of knowledge relating to your topic of inquiry.

The point of your literature review is to explain what is already known about your specific topic of inquiry and establish that the gap you have chosen is truly a gap in the body of knowledge. Coming out of your introduction, your reader will be aware of the broader context of your work and the general idea of what it is you'll be talking about. The literature review takes that context and blows it up into what will eventually become approximately the first 1200-1500 words of your paper (though word count varies across discipline and paper format).

How to Write a Lit Review

The goals of your lit review.

The first goal of your literature review is to, as the name implies, conduct an extensive review of the literature through little-r research. This involves more than just listing the sources and their content because you will be explaining connections between them whether they be agreements in data, disagreements in conclusions, etc.

The biggest mistake students make in their Lit Review - and we'll discuss this in more detail in a later section - is that they just list what sources say and do little to analyze what is actually known about a certain subject. This leads to a weak review of the literature and a murky, undeveloped gap. By connecting your sources, you are able to incorporate multiple perspectives, establish credibility, and at the end of the day, simply have a better reading lit review that truly explains the body of knowledge surrounding your topic.

The second goal of your literature review is to establish your gap and explain how:

it hasn't been covered by researchers before (this is justified through the fact that you just explained what is already known!)

why it is relevant to your discipline/topic

This part of your lit review is crucial to your research paper. This part of your paper connects your literature review - all of the known stuff - to what you are doing. This goal basically addresses the question, "ok so we just looked at aaaalllll of these sources, now what are you going to do", answering it with something along the lines of "well, we see that these sources have established [something] about my discipline, but no one has addressed [your gap], so I plan on researching it."

Using phrases like "This paper provides new insight on..." and "However, [researchers, be specific!] have overlooked [your research gap]" can make this especially clear, which is important because your gap is what lays the foundation of everything to come!

Clearing the Gap , Image From GIPHY

Varying Perspectives

An especially important part of your literature review is establishing and explaining, as the CollegeBoard puts it, "relevant scholarly works of varying perspectives". This means that your lit review cannot just be a bunch of summaries of random papers strewn across a page at random, despite the content being somewhat similar.

When writing, and more specifically when planning your lit review, understanding the perspectives of each of your papers, and being able to connect them in a way that they join hands , or naturally lead into one another in a logical chain of succession is invaluable.

To use myself as an example, in my literature review I focused on three sections: "Marxism and Labor", a section about the economic foundations of my topic, "Applications of Marxism to Film", in which I described how the previous section connects to film in a broader sense, and finally "Marxist Film Theory and Moon", which took the previous two sections and explicitly connected them to my film of interest. In building my Lit Review throughout these 3 sections, not only was I able to split up topics in a meaningful way, but each section built on itself, connecting to points made by previously mentioned sources.

Connecting Your Sources To Your Topic of Inquiry

When writing your literature review, every source you mention at some point or another will have to connect to your overall topic of inquiry, otherwise what's the point? Why would they be used? Thus, when you include a source, not only do you want to explain the content and what the source actually says in terms of the literature but you want to be explicit in explaining the relevancy and credibility of the source in connection to the content of your paper.

This will help you better connect your sources to each other. This is important because the quality of your literature review hinges on how it presents the known information to your readers and helps them understand why your project A) is connected to these sources and B) is a new addition to them.

When you're explicitly building on sources to connect them to the topic of your paper, you more effectively accomplish goal A because your reader doesn't have to do much guesswork. Then, when you move onto your gap, the fact that all of your sources are established as relevant will help you effectively justify your gap.

A sample structure of a literature review. Image from the University of Hull

What Not To Do: The Source Spaghetti

We've mentioned this a few times throughout this guide, but it needs repeating. There is one thing, and one thing only, that you should never do in your literature review, and that's something called "the source spaghetti". Basically, this is a method of writing a literature review where instead of planning or connecting sources to each other, you essentially list out your sources with a brief summary, quickly moving from source to source with very little rhyme or reason making your lit review muddled and unfocused, like reading a bowl of spaghetti.

While this certainly gets some information on the page, it is not an effective way of writing a literature review for the simple reason that you won't be able to have the level of detail that a good Lit Review requires.

Image from GIPHY

Rubric Points and Logistics

Now that we've gone over some tips and tricks, let's take a look directly at the rubric and see what the CollegeBoard explicitly states are the expectations for a lit review. For reference, the full rubric can be found here , and is the source for all the following rubric screenshots.

Seen above is the row of the AP Research scoring guidelines that best correspond to your literature review. Let's move from a one to a five and see what differentiates each point.

A literature review that earns a one and a two is marked by a single perspective, that is to say, it does not cover a wide variety of sources and does not effectively describe the body of knowledge surrounding a topic of inquiry. Papers that earn a one for the literature review typically use non-scholarly works as opposed to scholarly works in their research. For example, news sources do not count as scholarly, whereas research papers that have been peer-reviewed (that bit is important) do.

Moving into the three-point category, we see that a paper with this score does have varying perspectives and scholarly works, but lacks in the connections department. A paper with this score may have done some solid little-r research, but did not structure their lit review in such a way that the sources were able to be in discussion with one another. This is why a paper that uses a spaghetti sources way of organization will not be successful. Remember that connections between your sources are just as crucial as the content of the sources themselves.

The four and five categories meld into one. In fact, the text in the rubric is exactly the same. What separates a four and a five is a degree of sophistication in your writing. Where a 4 may hit all the points and do it well, a five does that and goes above and beyond. It's a very fine line and frankly, it's pretty subjective on the part of the reader. The easiest way to figure out what separates these two is to read sample fours and sample fives to see the difference for yourself.

Final Thoughts

Congratulations! If you've made it this far you have all the skills to get started on your literature review. Your next steps from here are to get started on your little-r research, start collecting sources, and get connecting. You got this!

Student Wellness

Stay connected.

© 2024 Fiveable Inc. All rights reserved.

Honours thesis in psychology/Developing a literature review

Guidelines and tips for developing a 4th year Honours thesis in psychology literature review.

• 1 What is a literature review?
• 2.1 Topic development
• 2.2 Guided reading
• 2.4 1st draft
• 2.5 2nd draft
• 2.6 3rd draft
• 2.7 4th draft
• 2.8 Tables and figures
• 3 Marking criteria
• 4 File management
• 5 Word processing
• 6 Citation management
• 7 Relationship to the research article

What is a literature review? [ edit | edit source ]

A literature review identifies a unique topic, establishes its importance, and summarises, reviews, and critiques key theory and research. The literature review also weighs the strengths and limitations of the existing literature and recommends future directions.

The task is to present an APA style manuscript which critically reviews key theoretical and research literature about a specific topic/problem and which is ready for submission to a journal for publication.

The literature review should contribute a unique, useful review of theory and research about a particular issue/gap/problem.

Good example literature reviews can be found, among other places, in the Annual Review of Psychology (e.g., [1] ).

Drafting process [ edit | edit source ]

Here is a suggested stage-by-stage drafting process:

Topic development [ edit | edit source ]

• Brainstorm (cast the net widely initially).
• The literature review may have a broader, narrower, similar, or different focus to a subsequent original research article. Do not necessarily assume that the literature review and research article are going to be about exactly the same topic. Often the literature review has a somewhat broader focus. For more info, see relationship to the research article .
• Sort through, merge, discard, and prioritise the brainstormed ideas.
• Whittle down
• research question
• working title

Guided reading [ edit | edit source ]

• Searching and reading can go on forever, so it is important to be strategic.
• Clearly establish the review's scope (i.e., What is relevant? What is not?) so that search terms are well targeted and the relevance of sources can be quickly assessed.
• Develop a bibliography of key references about the topic.
• Major literature reviews (especially recent systematic and meta-analytic reviews).
• Highly cited, peer reviewed, published articles which address relevant psychological theory and major studies.
• Access these references regardless of the difficulties in doing so - e.g., may require inter-library loan/document delivery requests.
• Read these sources, making notes about key points relevant to the literature review topic.

Plan [ edit | edit source ]

Develop an outline of the chapter and discuss with the thesis supervisor:

• clarify the focus of the review
• ensure a balanced review which fits into the overall word count
• "chunk" the drafting process into smaller sections
• Title (working)
• Abstract and keywords (as headings)
• ~2-3 pages or 300-500 words
• Introduce and describe the topic/problem/question, establish its importance, familiarise the reader with key terminology/concepts, show familiarity with the key literature, and orient the reader to the structure and direction of the review.
• Include major citations
• By the end of this section a reader should be clear about the purpose, need for, and focus of the review.
• Headings (likely to cover critical review of key theory and research): Aim for approx. 3 to 7 main headings. Sub-headings are optional (each main heading should have 0 or 2 to 5 sub-headings)
• Conclusion (includes future directions/recommendations)
• Word-count: Allocate an estimated word count to each of the major sections and overall. Note that the literature review is worth 40% of the 10,000 to 12,000 word thesis; so, on a proportional basis, aim for approximately 4,000 to 4,800 words, but often the literature review may be longer, up to perhaps ~6,500 words.
• Questions about the plan which you'd like to flag for discussion.
• It can be helpful to model the literature review on a favourite article (or thesis) - have a close look at the heading structure of some example literature reviews.
• Consider using the " writing funnel " in which the review starts broadly and gradually narrows down to focus on a specific problem.
• Seek feedback about the plan from the thesis supervisor, discuss, and revise the plan.

1st draft [ edit | edit source ]

• Turn the plan into a first draft by fleshing out the dot points into sentences and paragraphs.
• Aim roughly for a "Pass" standard.
• Sometimes people get "stuck" producing a first draft because they try to produce top-quality work. Quality can be addressed later. The goal for a first draft is to get a rough draft out for early feedback.
• Include any specific comments or questions for the supervisor.
• Seek feedback from the supervisor (including in-text Comments, Tracked Changes/Suggestions, and verbal discussion).

2nd draft [ edit | edit source ]

• Turn the 1st draft into a 2nd draft by rewriting to address supervisor feedback.
• Often the second draft involves greater integration of concepts; it may also involve some re-organisation of the structure.
• Work on linking between sections as well as tying together the key themes through the general introduction and conclusion.
• Aim for a "Credit" standard.
• Seek supervisor feedback (including via in-text Comments, Tracked Changes/Suggestions, and discussion).

3rd draft [ edit | edit source ]

• Turn the 2nd draft into a 3rd draft by rewriting, addressing supervisor feedback.
• Aim for a "Distinction" standard.
• Seek peer/stakeholder/other feedback (e.g., much can be learnt from reading and commenting on each other's work).

4th draft [ edit | edit source ]

• Turn the 3rd draft into a 4th draft by rewriting, addressing peer/other feedback.
• Aim for a "High Distinction" standard.
• This draft (or a subsequent draft) might be best completed after leaving the 3rd draft for a while and completing the 1st draft of the research article.

Tables and figures [ edit | edit source ]

Tables and figures can be a powerful way to communicate theories or conceptual ideas (e.g., see Figure 3).

Marking criteria [ edit | edit source ]

Consider the draft against the marking criteria:

• Clear and appropriate title
• Abstract - fluent explanation and summary of the content and purpose
• Importance of topic area and LR is established with definitions of important constructs
• Overview of theoretical or conceptual framework and literature to be used
• Clear explanation of content and direction of LR
• Explanation of appropriate theoretical or conceptual framework
• Integration of theoretical or conceptual framework throughout review
• Appropriate range of current, major, original (not reviews) sources used
• Thorough and detailed descriptions and synthesis of all aspects about the the research literature
• Critical interpretation of the research and its implications
• Synthesis and links within the material that reaches original and thoughtful conclusions
• Integration of diverse viewpoints
• Clear and thoughtful summary of ideas/topics within the review
• Quality of written expression, spelling, punctuation, and grammar

File management [ edit | edit source ]

• Smart word-processing techniques from the outset will pay off down the track.
• 00 Proposal
• 10 Literature review
• 11 Research article
• 20 Appendices
• 30 Final version
• Literature review 1.docx or Literature review_2022_03_21
• Literature review 2.docx or Literature review_2022_04_04 etc.
• Make sure a regular, reliable back-up system is in place (e.g., use automated cloud-based backup storage or manually email your latest versions to peers and/or supervisor). Electronic data corruption, loss of files etc. is insufficient grounds for extension.

Word processing [ edit | edit source ]

• Using Heading 1, 2, 3 etc. styles that match APA style. This will facilitate consistent styling and allow auto-generation of Tables of Contents.
• Style-based captions for Tables and Figures can also be used.

Citation management [ edit | edit source ]

• Citations and reference lists can be managed manually or by using citation management software (such as EndNote, Zotero, RefWorks etc.).
• Regardless of approach, be organised and systematic from the outset in collecting, storing, citing, and referencing key sources.

Relationship to the research article [ edit | edit source ]

• The literature review provides a critical review of theory and research about a specific topic and makes recommendations about future directions.
• The research article identifies a gap in the literature and reports about an original study designed to address this gap.
• The literature review will be longer than the introduction to the research article.
• The literature review may be broader in scope than the introduction to the research article.
• The introduction to the research article should state specific research question(s) and/or hypotheses to guide the study.
• Avoid presenting duplicate sentences in the literature review and introduction to the research article (self-plagiarism).

See also [ edit | edit source ]

• Literature review

• Honours thesis in psychology

Navigation menu

Research Paper Guide

How To Write A Literature Review

Last updated on: Feb 8, 2023

How to Write a Literature Review: Steps and Outline

By: Nathan D.

Reviewed By: Melisa C.

Published on: Jul 2, 2019

So you’re working on your research paper, thesis, or dissertation and you come across an unfamiliar term – “Literature Review.”

It sounds like a challenging concept; however, with the help of this guide, you will be able to understand how to write a literature review as well as its format.

Literature reviews are usually written in the field of humanities, sciences, and social sciences. They are written as a part of different lab reports and experiments in science. It is a part of  research paper writing  and every student must include it in his paper.

On this Page

What is a Literature Review

A literature review is a survey of the most relevant scholarly sources (journal articles, books, theses, etc.) that provide an insight into a particular topic. It gives a comprehensive look at the details about the topic, such as what has been said and by whom. Moreover, a literature review shows an overview of the key findings, central themes, revelations, developments, and different concepts regarding the research question.

A well-written literature review isn’t simply a listing of sources or a mere summary of different sources, instead it

• Examines, analyzes and evaluates the text
• Highlights different patterns and themes
• Explains the current state of the problem at hand.

How Does a Literature Review Differ From a Research Paper?

A research paper is a piece of academic writing based on the author’s original research on a particular issue or topic. It focuses on developing a new argument through different steps and elements – literature review is one of them. A literature review serves as a basis of gaining in-depth information about the topic at hand.

When writing a literature review, you need to present new ideas. The aim is to summarize and evaluate the existing work done by others.

It is also different from an annotated bibliography as it summarizes and synthesizes different sources including books, journals, and articles.

What is the Purpose of Literature Review?

A literature review aims to provide people with a guide about a particular topic – it presents the writer’s viewpoint about the topic and their position. It also comes in handy when people don’t have the time to carry out extensive research, going through the literature review can help understand the latest trends in the field, previous studies, advancements, etc.

It is essential that the researcher understands the existing work that has been done in his field of interest and then establishes his research question.

How to Write a Literature Review?

‘How to write a literature review for a research paper?’

‘How to write a scientific literature review?’

‘How to write a psychology literature review?’

Get all the answers in the coming sections.

Just as any other piece of writing, some steps and criteria must be followed to write a literature review. There isn’t a set word count that you must meet; the length depends upon the overall word count of the paper. Or you can ask your professor and follow their instructions.

Here are some important steps that can help you start a literature review.

1. Understand the Requirements

Before you begin writing your assignment, make sure that you clearly understand the requirements. Take your time reading the prompt and clarify different aspects, such as the number of sources that you need to include. 

What type of sources should you incorporate? Are you required to provide a brief summary of the sources or critique and evaluate them? Should the literature review have subheadings, etc?

2. Go Through Literature Review Examples

To get an idea of what literature reviews should look like, go through the ones written for the discipline that you are interested in. It will help you get an idea of how to present and organize your research.

3. Narrow your Focus

To write a literature review, you are going to get involved in exhaustive research. If you stick with a wider topic, it will be difficult for you to go through different books and articles. With a more focused topic, you can easily gather relevant information.

4. Select your Sources

There are thousands of different articles, journals, and other sources available on each topic – you can’t expect to go through each one of them. To filter out the sources that are most relevant and useful to your research question, go through their abstracts and decide if you want to use it. Ask yourself the following questions when choosing a source:

• What question is being addressed?
• What are the key points, models, methodologies?
• Are there some frameworks used?
• What is the result of the study?
• Strengths and weaknesses.
• Contribution towards the field.

5. Cite the Sources

When you select a source, it is a good practice to write them down and cite them as you go - this helps avoid plagiarism. You can use APA, MLA, or any other format according to your requirements.

6. Figure Out the Literature Review Structure

When it comes to writing a literature review, you can outline it using various ways such as:

7. Drafting

A literature review comprises three sections – introduction, body, and conclusion. In the introduction, highlight the purpose and the focal point of your research.

The body incorporates the following points:

• Brief description of the publication
• Highlights its main points
• Talks about the gaps in research
• Assesses and evaluates how it contributed towards the overall topic

Conclude the literature review by discussing their significance.

Simply follow these steps to come up with an interesting literature review for your research paper. If you need help writing the rest of the components, check out this detailed blog on  research paper outline .

Literature Review Example

LITERATURE REVIEW EXAMPLE

We hope that all of your queries were catered to in this blog, in case you are still confused about the writing process or need a professional essay writing service with your research, reach out to us. 5StarEssays is a specialized writing service that offers quality academic papers and writing assistance to students.

Get in touch with our customer support representative and place your  order  today!

Frequently Asked Questions

How long is a literature review.

Typically, a literature review is between 2000 and 3000 words. But, its length depends on the scope of the work and the number of studies and research you have studied for your paper.

How many sources should a literature review have?

While there are no hard and fast rules regarding the number of sources added in the literature. However, if it is a standalone project and you are writing a 10-page literature review then it should examine at least 30 sources.

How many pages should a literature review be?

For a thesis or dissertation, the literature review must be at least 20 pages long. But, it solely depends on the length and scope of the work.

How old should sources be in a literature review?

Roughly, the sources should be no more than 10 years old for humanities, literature, art, and history papers.

What sources are not appropriate for a literature review?

Sources that you should not include in a literature review are magazines, non-published works, websites, and newspapers.

How long does it take to write a literature review?

It takes roughly 2 to 6 months to write a literature review. However, it depends on how many hours you dedicate to it each day and the length of the review.

Masters Essay, College Admission Essay

Nathan completed his Ph.D. in journalism and has been writing articles for well-respected publications for many years now. His work is carefully researched and insightful, showing a true passion for the written word. Nathan's clients appreciate his expertise, deep understanding of the process, and ability to communicate difficult concepts clearly.

Was This Blog Helpful?

Keep reading.

• How to Write a Research Paper - Writing Guide & Examples

• 20+ Thesis Statement Examples for Research Papers

• Learn How to Write an Abstract - Steps & Examples

• How to Start a Research Paper - 9 Simple Steps

• Psychology Research Topics - 170+ Ideas for Your Paper

• How to Write a Hypothesis - A Step-by-Step Guide

• Writing a Research Proposal - Outline, Format, and Examples

• Good Research Paper Topics & Ideas for Students

• Good History Research Paper Topics For Your Help

• How to Cite a Research Paper with the Help of Examples

• How to Write a Research Methodology in 10 Simple Steps

• Research Paper Outline - Basic Format & Sample

• Research Paper Example: Samples to Write a Research Paper

• Great Sociology Research Topics & Ideas (2024)

People Also Read

• informative essay topics
• thesis introduction writing
• literary analysis essay topics
• how to write an essay
• analytical essay example

Burdened With Assignments?

Advertisement

• Homework Services: Essay Topics Generator

© 2024 - All rights reserved

Reviews are normally by invitation only. Unsolicited articles are rarely considered, but if you wish to enquire further about the suitability of your article, you can email the Editorial office of BMC Medicine at [email protected] .

Reviews are summaries of insights or advances in specific research areas within the scope of BMC Medicine . Key aims of BMC Medicine reviews are to provide timely, systematic and substantial coverage of a mature topic, to evaluate progress in specified areas, and/or to provide critical assessments of emerging technologies.

Reviews are usually commissioned from recognized experts in a particular field, and we ask authors to provide a balanced overview of the field and not to focus on their own work or that of their close colleagues.

Reviews should be approximately 3000 words and the abstract should not exceed 350 words and should be structured with a background, main body and short conclusion.

Preparing your manuscript

The title page should:

• "A versus B in the treatment of C: a randomized controlled trial", "X is a risk factor for Y: a case control study", "What is the impact of factor X on subject Y: A systematic review"
• or for non-clinical or non-research studies: a description of what the article reports
• if a collaboration group should be listed as an author, please list the Group name as an author. If you would like the names of the individual members of the Group to be searchable through their individual PubMed records, please include this information in the “Acknowledgements” section in accordance with the instructions below
• Large Language Models (LLMs), such as  ChatGPT , do not currently satisfy our  authorship criteria . Notably an attribution of authorship carries with it accountability for the work, which cannot be effectively applied to LLMs. Use of an LLM should be properly documented in the Methods section (and if a Methods section is not available, in a suitable alternative part) of the manuscript
• indicate the corresponding author

The Abstract should not exceed 350 words and should be structured with a background, main body of the abstract and short conclusion. Please minimize the use of abbreviations and do not cite references in the abstract.

Three to ten keywords representing the main content of the article.

The Background section should explain the background to the article, its aims, a summary of a search of the existing literature and the issue under discussion.

This should contain the body of the article, and may also be broken into subsections with short, informative headings.

Conclusions

This should state clearly the main conclusions and include an explanation of their relevance or importance to the field.

List of abbreviations

If abbreviations are used in the text they should be defined in the text at first use, and a list of abbreviations should be provided.

Declarations

All manuscripts must contain the following sections under the heading 'Declarations':

Ethics approval and consent to participate

Consent for publication, availability of data and materials, competing interests, authors' contributions, acknowledgements.

• Authors' information (optional)

Please see below for details on the information to be included in these sections.

If any of the sections are not relevant to your manuscript, please include the heading and write 'Not applicable' for that section. 

Manuscripts reporting studies involving human participants, human data or human tissue must:

• include a statement on ethics approval and consent (even where the need for approval was waived)
• include the name of the ethics committee that approved the study and the committee’s reference number if appropriate

Studies involving animals must include a statement on ethics approval and for experimental studies involving client-owned animals, authors must also include a statement on informed consent from the client or owner.

See our editorial policies for more information.

If your manuscript does not report on or involve the use of any animal or human data or tissue, please state “Not applicable” in this section.

If your manuscript contains any individual person’s data in any form (including any individual details, images or videos), consent for publication must be obtained from that person, or in the case of children, their parent or legal guardian. All presentations of case reports must have consent for publication.

You can use your institutional consent form or our consent form if you prefer. You should not send the form to us on submission, but we may request to see a copy at any stage (including after publication).

See our editorial policies for more information on consent for publication.

If your manuscript does not contain data from any individual person, please state “Not applicable” in this section.

All manuscripts must include an ‘Availability of data and materials’ statement. Data availability statements should include information on where data supporting the results reported in the article can be found including, where applicable, hyperlinks to publicly archived datasets analysed or generated during the study. By data we mean the minimal dataset that would be necessary to interpret, replicate and build upon the findings reported in the article. We recognise it is not always possible to share research data publicly, for instance when individual privacy could be compromised, and in such instances data availability should still be stated in the manuscript along with any conditions for access.

Authors are also encouraged to preserve search strings on searchRxiv https://searchrxiv.org/ , an archive to support researchers to report, store and share their searches consistently and to enable them to review and re-use existing searches. searchRxiv enables researchers to obtain a digital object identifier (DOI) for their search, allowing it to be cited. 

Data availability statements can take one of the following forms (or a combination of more than one if required for multiple datasets):

• The datasets generated and/or analysed during the current study are available in the [NAME] repository, [PERSISTENT WEB LINK TO DATASETS]
• The datasets used and/or analysed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
• All data generated or analysed during this study are included in this published article [and its supplementary information files].
• The datasets generated and/or analysed during the current study are not publicly available due [REASON WHY DATA ARE NOT PUBLIC] but are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
• Data sharing is not applicable to this article as no datasets were generated or analysed during the current study.
• The data that support the findings of this study are available from [third party name] but restrictions apply to the availability of these data, which were used under license for the current study, and so are not publicly available. Data are however available from the authors upon reasonable request and with permission of [third party name].
• Not applicable. If your manuscript does not contain any data, please state 'Not applicable' in this section.

More examples of template data availability statements, which include examples of openly available and restricted access datasets, are available here .

BioMed Central strongly encourages the citation of any publicly available data on which the conclusions of the paper rely in the manuscript. Data citations should include a persistent identifier (such as a DOI) and should ideally be included in the reference list. Citations of datasets, when they appear in the reference list, should include the minimum information recommended by DataCite and follow journal style. Dataset identifiers including DOIs should be expressed as full URLs. For example:

Hao Z, AghaKouchak A, Nakhjiri N, Farahmand A. Global integrated drought monitoring and prediction system (GIDMaPS) data sets. figshare. 2014. http://dx.doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.853801

With the corresponding text in the Availability of data and materials statement:

The datasets generated during and/or analysed during the current study are available in the [NAME] repository, [PERSISTENT WEB LINK TO DATASETS]. [Reference number]  

If you wish to co-submit a data note describing your data to be published in BMC Research Notes , you can do so by visiting our submission portal . Data notes support open data and help authors to comply with funder policies on data sharing. Co-published data notes will be linked to the research article the data support ( example ).

All financial and non-financial competing interests must be declared in this section.

See our editorial policies for a full explanation of competing interests. If you are unsure whether you or any of your co-authors have a competing interest please contact the editorial office.

Please use the authors initials to refer to each authors' competing interests in this section.

If you do not have any competing interests, please state "The authors declare that they have no competing interests" in this section.

All sources of funding for the research reported should be declared. If the funder has a specific role in the conceptualization, design, data collection, analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript, this should be declared.

The individual contributions of authors to the manuscript should be specified in this section. Guidance and criteria for authorship can be found in our editorial policies .

Please use initials to refer to each author's contribution in this section, for example: "FC analyzed and interpreted the patient data regarding the hematological disease and the transplant. RH performed the histological examination of the kidney, and was a major contributor in writing the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript."

Please acknowledge anyone who contributed towards the article who does not meet the criteria for authorship including anyone who provided professional writing services or materials.

Authors should obtain permission to acknowledge from all those mentioned in the Acknowledgements section.

See our editorial policies for a full explanation of acknowledgements and authorship criteria.

If you do not have anyone to acknowledge, please write "Not applicable" in this section.

Group authorship (for manuscripts involving a collaboration group): if you would like the names of the individual members of a collaboration Group to be searchable through their individual PubMed records, please ensure that the title of the collaboration Group is included on the title page and in the submission system and also include collaborating author names as the last paragraph of the “Acknowledgements” section. Please add authors in the format First Name, Middle initial(s) (optional), Last Name. You can add institution or country information for each author if you wish, but this should be consistent across all authors.

Please note that individual names may not be present in the PubMed record at the time a published article is initially included in PubMed as it takes PubMed additional time to code this information.

Authors' information

This section is optional.

You may choose to use this section to include any relevant information about the author(s) that may aid the reader's interpretation of the article, and understand the standpoint of the author(s). This may include details about the authors' qualifications, current positions they hold at institutions or societies, or any other relevant background information. Please refer to authors using their initials. Note this section should not be used to describe any competing interests.

Footnotes can be used to give additional information, which may include the citation of a reference included in the reference list. They should not consist solely of a reference citation, and they should never include the bibliographic details of a reference. They should also not contain any figures or tables.

Footnotes to the text are numbered consecutively; those to tables should be indicated by superscript lower-case letters (or asterisks for significance values and other statistical data). Footnotes to the title or the authors of the article are not given reference symbols.

Always use footnotes instead of endnotes.

Examples of the Vancouver reference style are shown below.

See our editorial policies for author guidance on good citation practice

Web links and URLs: All web links and URLs, including links to the authors' own websites, should be given a reference number and included in the reference list rather than within the text of the manuscript. They should be provided in full, including both the title of the site and the URL, as well as the date the site was accessed, in the following format: The Mouse Tumor Biology Database. http://tumor.informatics.jax.org/mtbwi/index.do . Accessed 20 May 2013. If an author or group of authors can clearly be associated with a web link, such as for weblogs, then they should be included in the reference.

Example reference style:

Article within a journal

Smith JJ. The world of science. Am J Sci. 1999;36:234-5.

Article within a journal (no page numbers)

Rohrmann S, Overvad K, Bueno-de-Mesquita HB, Jakobsen MU, Egeberg R, Tjønneland A, et al. Meat consumption and mortality - results from the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition. BMC Medicine. 2013;11:63.

Article within a journal by DOI

Slifka MK, Whitton JL. Clinical implications of dysregulated cytokine production. Dig J Mol Med. 2000; doi:10.1007/s801090000086.

Article within a journal supplement

Frumin AM, Nussbaum J, Esposito M. Functional asplenia: demonstration of splenic activity by bone marrow scan. Blood 1979;59 Suppl 1:26-32.

Book chapter, or an article within a book

Wyllie AH, Kerr JFR, Currie AR. Cell death: the significance of apoptosis. In: Bourne GH, Danielli JF, Jeon KW, editors. International review of cytology. London: Academic; 1980. p. 251-306.

OnlineFirst chapter in a series (without a volume designation but with a DOI)

Saito Y, Hyuga H. Rate equation approaches to amplification of enantiomeric excess and chiral symmetry breaking. Top Curr Chem. 2007. doi:10.1007/128_2006_108.

Complete book, authored

Blenkinsopp A, Paxton P. Symptoms in the pharmacy: a guide to the management of common illness. 3rd ed. Oxford: Blackwell Science; 1998.

Online document

Doe J. Title of subordinate document. In: The dictionary of substances and their effects. Royal Society of Chemistry. 1999. http://www.rsc.org/dose/title of subordinate document. Accessed 15 Jan 1999.

Online database

Healthwise Knowledgebase. US Pharmacopeia, Rockville. 1998. http://www.healthwise.org. Accessed 21 Sept 1998.

Supplementary material/private homepage

Doe J. Title of supplementary material. 2000. http://www.privatehomepage.com. Accessed 22 Feb 2000.

University site

Doe, J: Title of preprint. http://www.uni-heidelberg.de/mydata.html (1999). Accessed 25 Dec 1999.

Doe, J: Trivial HTTP, RFC2169. ftp://ftp.isi.edu/in-notes/rfc2169.txt (1999). Accessed 12 Nov 1999.

Organization site

ISSN International Centre: The ISSN register. http://www.issn.org (2006). Accessed 20 Feb 2007.

Dataset with persistent identifier

Zheng L-Y, Guo X-S, He B, Sun L-J, Peng Y, Dong S-S, et al. Genome data from sweet and grain sorghum (Sorghum bicolor). GigaScience Database. 2011. http://dx.doi.org/10.5524/100012 .

Figures, tables and additional files

See  General formatting guidelines  for information on how to format figures, tables and additional files.

Submit manuscript

• Editorial Team
• Editorial Board
• Call for papers
• Editor’s choice
• Sign up for article alerts and news from this journal
• Manuscript editing services

Annual Journal Metrics

2022 Citation Impact 9.3 - 2-year Impact Factor 10.4 - 5-year Impact Factor 3.011 - SNIP (Source Normalized Impact per Paper) 3.447 - SJR (SCImago Journal Rank)

2023 Speed 6 days submission to first editorial decision for all manuscripts (Median) 145 days submission to accept (Median)

2023 Usage  6,375,113 downloads 24,228 Altmetric mentions 

• More about our metrics

Announcements

medRxiv transfers

BMC Medicine  is happy to consider manuscripts that have been, or will be, posted on a preprint server. Authors are able to submit their manuscripts directly from  medRxiv , without having to re-upload files.

Registered reports

BMC Medicine is accepting Registered Reports. Find out more about this innovative format in our Submission Guidelines .

• Follow us on Twitter

BMC Medicine

ISSN: 1741-7015

• Submission enquiries: [email protected]
• General enquiries: [email protected]

• What Is a PhD Literature Review?
• Doing a PhD

A literature review is a critical analysis of published academic literature, mainly peer-reviewed papers and books, on a specific topic. This isn’t just a list of published studies but is a document summarising and critically appraising the main work by researchers in the field, the key findings, limitations and gaps identified in the knowledge.

• The aim of a literature review is to critically assess the literature in your chosen field of research and be able to present an overview of the current knowledge gained from previous work.
• By the conclusion of your literature review, you as a researcher should have identified the gaps in knowledge in your field; i.e. the unanswered research questions which your PhD project will help to answer.
• Quality not quantity is the approach to use when writing a literature review for a PhD but as a general rule of thumb, most are between 6,000 and 12,000 words.

What Is the Purpose of a Literature Review?

First, to be clear on what a PhD literature review is NOT: it is not a ‘paper by paper’ summary of what others have done in your field. All you’re doing here is listing out all the papers and book chapters you’ve found with some text joining things together. This is a common mistake made by PhD students early on in their research project. This is a sign of poor academic writing and if it’s not picked up by your supervisor, it’ll definitely be by your examiners.

The biggest issue your examiners will have here is that you won’t have demonstrated an application of critical thinking when examining existing knowledge from previous research. This is an important part of the research process as a PhD student. It’s needed to show where the gaps in knowledge were, and how then you were able to identify the novelty of each research question and subsequent work.

The five main outcomes from carrying out a good literature review should be:

• An understanding of what has been published in your subject area of research,
• An appreciation of the leading research groups and authors in your field and their key contributions to the research topic,
• Knowledge of the key theories in your field,
• Knowledge of the main research areas within your field of interest,
• A clear understanding of the research gap in knowledge that will help to motivate your PhD research questions .

When assessing the academic papers or books that you’ve come across, you must think about the strengths and weaknesses of them; what was novel about their work and what were the limitations? Are different sources of relevant literature coming to similar conclusions and complementing each other, or are you seeing different outcomes on the same topic by different researchers?

When Should I Write My Literature Review?

In the structure of your PhD thesis , your literature review is effectively your first main chapter. It’s at the start of your thesis and should, therefore, be a task you perform at the start of your research. After all, you need to have reviewed the literature to work out how your research can contribute novel findings to your area of research. Sometimes, however, in particular when you apply for a PhD project with a pre-defined research title and research questions, your supervisor may already know where the gaps in knowledge are.

You may be tempted to skip the literature review and dive straight into tackling the set questions (then completing the review at the end before thesis submission) but we strongly advise against this. Whilst your supervisor will be very familiar with the area, you as a doctoral student will not be and so it is essential that you gain this understanding before getting into the research.

How Long Should the Literature Review Be?

As your literature review will be one of your main thesis chapters, it needs to be a substantial body of work. It’s not a good strategy to have a thesis writing process here based on a specific word count, but know that most reviews are typically between 6,000 and 12,000 words. The length will depend on how much relevant material has previously been published in your field.

A point to remember though is that the review needs to be easy to read and avoid being filled with unnecessary information; in your search of selected literature, consider filtering out publications that don’t appear to add anything novel to the discussion – this might be useful in fields with hundreds of papers.

How Do I Write the Literature Review?

Before you start writing your literature review, you need to be clear on the topic you are researching.

1. Evaluating and Selecting the Publications

After completing your literature search and downloading all the papers you find, you may find that you have a lot of papers to read through ! You may find that you have so many papers that it’s unreasonable to read through all of them in their entirety, so you need to find a way to understand what they’re about and decide if they’re important quickly.

A good starting point is to read the abstract of the paper to gauge if it is useful and, as you do so, consider the following questions in your mind:

• What was the overarching aim of the paper?
• What was the methodology used by the authors?
• Was this an experimental study or was this more theoretical in its approach?
• What were the results and what did the authors conclude in their paper?
• How does the data presented in this paper relate to other publications within this field?
• Does it add new knowledge, does it raise more questions or does it confirm what is already known in your field? What is the key concept that the study described?
• What are the strengths and weaknesses of this study, and in particular, what are the limitations?

2. Identifying Themes

To put together the structure of your literature review you need to identify the common themes that emerge from the collective papers and books that you have read. Key things to think about are:

• Are there common methodologies different authors have used or have these changed over time?
• Do the research questions change over time or are the key question’s still unanswered?
• Is there general agreement between different research groups in the main results and outcomes, or do different authors provide differing points of view and different conclusions?
• What are the key papers in your field that have had the biggest impact on the research?
• Have different publications identified similar weaknesses or limitations or gaps in the knowledge that still need to be addressed?

Structuring and Writing Your Literature Review

There are several ways in which you can structure a literature review and this may depend on if, for example, your project is a science or non-science based PhD.

One approach may be to tell a story about how your research area has developed over time. You need to be careful here that you don’t just describe the different papers published in chronological order but that you discuss how different studies have motivated subsequent studies, how the knowledge has developed over time in your field, concluding with what is currently known, and what is currently not understood.

Alternatively, you may find from reading your papers that common themes emerge and it may be easier to develop your review around these, i.e. a thematic review. For example, if you are writing up about bridge design, you may structure the review around the themes of regulation, analysis, and sustainability.

As another approach, you might want to talk about the different research methodologies that have been used. You could then compare and contrast the results and ultimate conclusions that have been drawn from each.

As with all your chapters in your thesis, your literature review will be broken up into three key headings, with the basic structure being the introduction, the main body and conclusion. Within the main body, you will use several subheadings to separate out the topics depending on if you’re structuring it by the time period, the methods used or the common themes that have emerged.

The important thing to think about as you write your main body of text is to summarise the key takeaway messages from each research paper and how they come together to give one or more conclusions. Don’t just stop at summarising the papers though, instead continue on to give your analysis and your opinion on how these previous publications fit into the wider research field and where they have an impact. Emphasise the strengths of the studies you have evaluated also be clear on the limitations of previous work how these may have influenced the results and conclusions of the studies.

In your concluding paragraphs focus your discussion on how your critical evaluation of literature has helped you identify unanswered research questions and how you plan to address these in your PhD project. State the research problem you’re going to address and end with the overarching aim and key objectives of your work .

When writing at a graduate level, you have to take a critical approach when reading existing literature in your field to determine if and how it added value to existing knowledge. You may find that a large number of the papers on your reference list have the right academic context but are essentially saying the same thing. As a graduate student, you’ll need to take a methodological approach to work through this existing research to identify what is relevant literature and what is not.

You then need to go one step further to interpret and articulate the current state of what is known, based on existing theories, and where the research gaps are. It is these gaps in the literature that you will address in your own research project.

• Decide on a research area and an associated research question.
• Decide on the extent of your scope and start looking for literature.
• Review and evaluate the literature.
• Plan an outline for your literature review and start writing it.

Browse PhDs Now

Join thousands of students.

Join thousands of other students and stay up to date with the latest PhD programmes, funding opportunities and advice.

Writing your Literature Review

[ Study Skills ] [ Writing Academically ] [ Dissertations ] [ Exams & Doing Research ] [ Plagiarism & Critical Thinking ] [ Reading & Note Taking ] [ Referencing & Scholarship ]

[ Assignment & Essay Writing ] [ Assignment Basics ] [ Writing Reflectively ]

The literature review must survey the existing research that is relevant to the question that is addressed by your research project. Your dissertation tutor may be able to give you some pointers but really it is down to you to go and find as much relevant information as possible.

It is not possible to give specific advice on writing a literature review simply because every literature review is different! However, some general guidance can be given:

For a 10,000 word piece of primary research the literature review is typically around 4,000 words in length. A piece of secondary research is usually in the form of an extended literature review.

How do you decide what is relevant? This can be tricky, but the main thing is to make decisions as you clarify the focus of your project.

It may be relevant to address:

• research that focuses on the same subject as your own;
• research that uses the same methodology as yours;
• research that does not focus on the same subject but on a related subject whose relevance you can state clearly;
• government guidance or professional frameworks that have some relationship to the subject of your study;
• definition of key terms in your study which help to clarify its purpose.

This is not an exhaustive list, but it may help you to proceed. A common problem is that no-one else has done research in your particular area. This is when it is particularly important to look into studies in related areas or with comparable methodologies.

Presentation

There is no one correct way to present a literature review (unless your dissertation tutor expresses a preference for one type of structure). The most important thing to remember is that the literature review must be structured clearly.

This usually means that you will need to think about how you intend to group the information you have found. It is often useful to include a mini-introduction that explains how the information will be structured.

Some literature reviews include sub-headings and some do not. If you want to use them check with your dissertation tutor.  Be aware that imprecise or overly  frequent sub-headings can reduce the clarity and readability of your work.

Criticality and Literature Reviews

To some extent a literature review is simply a well-organised account of the literature that you have discovered that is relevant to your study. However, it is usually appropriate to include some evaluation of this literature. This might involve:

• criticism of the methodology of other research which draws attention to its strengths and weaknesses, or similarities / differences when compared to your own study;
• commentary on the agreement or disagreement between the different sources that are contained within your literature review;
• discussion of underlying problems that are common to the different sources that you have found.

This is not an exhaustive list of the ways that you can demonstrate criticality in a literature review.

Remember that it is not normally good to anticipate your own findings in the literature review. You can refer back to the literature review in your findings section.

Conclusion in a Literature Review

It is usually good to include a brief conclusion to summarize the key points in your evaluation of the existing literature.

Useful Websites

This  excellent guide  from the Writing Centre has essentially been written for an American audience, but the advice is fairly generic. This  guide  is directed specifically at Literature Reviews in Sport’s Science.

Back to top

• Customer Reviews
• Extended Essays
• IB Internal Assessment
• Theory of Knowledge
• Literature Review
• Dissertations
• Essay Writing
• Research Writing
• Assignment Help
• Capstone Projects
• College Application
• Online Class

How Long Is a Literature Review? (Quick Answer!)

by  Antony W

February 9, 2023

Once you know how to write a literature review from scratch, you can confidently work on the introduction, the main body, and the conclusion. But how long is a literature review? 

How long a literature review is depends on purpose and audience. It can be 20 pages or more for a dissertation but shorter for regular assignments. Whether you write 4 or 20 pages, ensure you stick to the standard structure to score top grades.  

Key Takeaways 

• A literature review for a thesis must not be more than 20% of the project’s length.
• If you’re writing a 100 to 150 pages dissertation, you can make the review 40 to 60 pages long. 
• An 8-page research paper should have a literature review of no more than 2 pages long.
• For a 5,000-word journal article, the literature review section should be 1,200 to 2,000 words long.
• A 25-page capstone project should have 5 to 6 pages literature review.

How Long is a Literature Review? (Understanding the Ideal Length)

The length of a literature review depends on the audience, purpose, and a student’s level of education. 

The literature review written by an undergraduate student is shorter unlike the review written by a PhD student. It gets even shorter for an essay – if your instructor ever ask you to include one.

Ideally, the average length of a literature review should be between 20 and 40 percent of the entire project.

For example, if your professor asks you to write a 10,000 words dissertation, 2,000 words of the total word count will be the literature review.

Literature Review Writing Help

The literature review chapter requires research, analysis, and synthesis. Given the depth of research involved and the structuring and writing process, it can take a while to get the work done.

If you have a few days left to complete the review but you have other more demanding assignments, take advantage of our literature review assignment help and one of our top writers will help you get the work done.

How Long Should a Thesis Literature Review Be?

A thesis is a research assignment written by undergraduates and postgraduates. Its length vary depending on the level of study.

A thesis written by Masters’ degree and Doctorate students is 60 to 100 pages long and the one written by Bachelor’s degree students is between 40 and 60 pages long.

The literature review for a project of this nature is at least 8 pages long or at most 20% of the overall word count of the project.

For example, if you’re writing a 40-page thesis, your literature review should be at least 8 pages. If your instructor states that you make your thesis 60 pages long, the literature review should be at most 12 pages. 

How Many Pages Should Journal Articles’ Literature Review Be?

Journal articles are not only shorter than books, but they’re also very specific in context because they focus on specific topics.

Because experts write them throughout the year, journal articles can present case studies, original research, methodologies, and short reports on specific areas or review articles.

The average length for journal articles is 5,000 words. As such, expect the length of the literature review to be at least 2 pages – or just a few more pages depending on how many words you write.

For example, a 5000-word journal article should have a literature review of no more than 2,000 words.

How Long is a Literature Review for a Capstone Project? 

Often written as part of a college or university course in the final year of middle or high school, a capstone project is an assignment that summaries a student’s experience.

The project requires students to select a topic, create a proposal, conduct research, and write the paper.

On average, a capstone project is 20 to 25 pages. While you can make the assignment longer, it should be no more than 45 pages.

How long the literature review section of the capstone project should be depends on the length of the assignment and/or the instructions issued by a teacher. For a 25-page capstone project, about 5 to 6 pages of literature review should be enough. 

What’s the Literature Review Length for Research Paper?

In a research paper, you argue a point by analyzing a perspective based on an individual perception. The assignment takes some time to complete because it requires both research and analytical skills.

A research can be long or short depending on the area of study. Shorter papers tend to be between 5 and 8 pages long, meaning you do have to go straight to the point in your writing, as you don’t have room for more words.

Because a research paper requires a closer examination of existing studies before the methodology chapter, it has to have a literature review.

The literature review for a research paper varies in length based on the nature of the assignment. For example, if your instructor asks you to write an 8-page research paper, you should have a 2-page literature review for the assignment.  

How Long is a Literature Review for a Dissertation?

A dissertation is a project completed as part of a postgraduate degree. Student have to present their findings on their area of study in a dissertation defense.

The length of the literature review for this assignment depends on the field of study, the topic selected, and the type of analysis required.

A dissertation is a 150 to 300 pages long project. The review for a project this big should be between 40 and 60 pages.

There is some flexibility here, so you don’t have to panic if your work doesn’t hit the 60-page target.

Final Thoughts

The takeaway from this post is that the length of a literature review depends on the type of project, the length of the project, and the level of study.

Also, it’s important to read the assignment brief provided by your instructor, as it helps to steer you in the right direction as you write the review.

About the author 

Antony W is a professional writer and coach at Help for Assessment. He spends countless hours every day researching and writing great content filled with expert advice on how to write engaging essays, research papers, and assignments.

Loading metrics

Open Access

Ten Simple Rules for Writing a Literature Review

* E-mail: [email protected]

Affiliations Centre for Functional and Evolutionary Ecology (CEFE), CNRS, Montpellier, France, Centre for Biodiversity Synthesis and Analysis (CESAB), FRB, Aix-en-Provence, France

• Marco Pautasso

Published: July 18, 2013

• https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1003149
• Reader Comments

Citation: Pautasso M (2013) Ten Simple Rules for Writing a Literature Review. PLoS Comput Biol 9(7): e1003149. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1003149

Editor: Philip E. Bourne, University of California San Diego, United States of America

Copyright: © 2013 Marco Pautasso. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Funding: This work was funded by the French Foundation for Research on Biodiversity (FRB) through its Centre for Synthesis and Analysis of Biodiversity data (CESAB), as part of the NETSEED research project. The funders had no role in the preparation of the manuscript.

Competing interests: The author has declared that no competing interests exist.

Literature reviews are in great demand in most scientific fields. Their need stems from the ever-increasing output of scientific publications [1] . For example, compared to 1991, in 2008 three, eight, and forty times more papers were indexed in Web of Science on malaria, obesity, and biodiversity, respectively [2] . Given such mountains of papers, scientists cannot be expected to examine in detail every single new paper relevant to their interests [3] . Thus, it is both advantageous and necessary to rely on regular summaries of the recent literature. Although recognition for scientists mainly comes from primary research, timely literature reviews can lead to new synthetic insights and are often widely read [4] . For such summaries to be useful, however, they need to be compiled in a professional way [5] .

When starting from scratch, reviewing the literature can require a titanic amount of work. That is why researchers who have spent their career working on a certain research issue are in a perfect position to review that literature. Some graduate schools are now offering courses in reviewing the literature, given that most research students start their project by producing an overview of what has already been done on their research issue [6] . However, it is likely that most scientists have not thought in detail about how to approach and carry out a literature review.

Reviewing the literature requires the ability to juggle multiple tasks, from finding and evaluating relevant material to synthesising information from various sources, from critical thinking to paraphrasing, evaluating, and citation skills [7] . In this contribution, I share ten simple rules I learned working on about 25 literature reviews as a PhD and postdoctoral student. Ideas and insights also come from discussions with coauthors and colleagues, as well as feedback from reviewers and editors.

Rule 1: Define a Topic and Audience

How to choose which topic to review? There are so many issues in contemporary science that you could spend a lifetime of attending conferences and reading the literature just pondering what to review. On the one hand, if you take several years to choose, several other people may have had the same idea in the meantime. On the other hand, only a well-considered topic is likely to lead to a brilliant literature review [8] . The topic must at least be:

• interesting to you (ideally, you should have come across a series of recent papers related to your line of work that call for a critical summary),
• an important aspect of the field (so that many readers will be interested in the review and there will be enough material to write it), and
• a well-defined issue (otherwise you could potentially include thousands of publications, which would make the review unhelpful).

Ideas for potential reviews may come from papers providing lists of key research questions to be answered [9] , but also from serendipitous moments during desultory reading and discussions. In addition to choosing your topic, you should also select a target audience. In many cases, the topic (e.g., web services in computational biology) will automatically define an audience (e.g., computational biologists), but that same topic may also be of interest to neighbouring fields (e.g., computer science, biology, etc.).

Rule 2: Search and Re-search the Literature

After having chosen your topic and audience, start by checking the literature and downloading relevant papers. Five pieces of advice here:

• keep track of the search items you use (so that your search can be replicated [10] ),
• keep a list of papers whose pdfs you cannot access immediately (so as to retrieve them later with alternative strategies),
• use a paper management system (e.g., Mendeley, Papers, Qiqqa, Sente),
• define early in the process some criteria for exclusion of irrelevant papers (these criteria can then be described in the review to help define its scope), and
• do not just look for research papers in the area you wish to review, but also seek previous reviews.

The chances are high that someone will already have published a literature review ( Figure 1 ), if not exactly on the issue you are planning to tackle, at least on a related topic. If there are already a few or several reviews of the literature on your issue, my advice is not to give up, but to carry on with your own literature review,

• PPT PowerPoint slide
• PNG larger image
• TIFF original image

The bottom-right situation (many literature reviews but few research papers) is not just a theoretical situation; it applies, for example, to the study of the impacts of climate change on plant diseases, where there appear to be more literature reviews than research studies [33] .

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1003149.g001

• discussing in your review the approaches, limitations, and conclusions of past reviews,
• trying to find a new angle that has not been covered adequately in the previous reviews, and
• incorporating new material that has inevitably accumulated since their appearance.

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.

Rule 3: Take Notes While Reading

If you read the papers first, and only afterwards start writing the review, you will need a very good memory to remember who wrote what, and what your impressions and associations were while reading each single paper. My advice is, while reading, to start writing down interesting pieces of information, insights about how to organize the review, and thoughts on what to write. This way, by the time you have read the literature you selected, you will already have a rough draft of the review.

Of course, this draft will still need much rewriting, restructuring, and rethinking to obtain a text with a coherent argument [11] , but you will have avoided the danger posed by staring at a blank document. Be careful when taking notes to use quotation marks if you are provisionally copying verbatim from the literature. It is advisable then to reformulate such quotes with your own words in the final draft. It is important to be careful in noting the references already at this stage, so as to avoid misattributions. Using referencing software from the very beginning of your endeavour will save you time.

Rule 4: Choose the Type of Review You Wish to Write

After having taken notes while reading the literature, you will have a rough idea of the amount of material available for the review. This is probably a good time to decide whether to go for a mini- or a full review. Some journals are now favouring the publication of rather short reviews focusing on the last few years, with a limit on the number of words and citations. A mini-review is not necessarily a minor review: it may well attract more attention from busy readers, although it will inevitably simplify some issues and leave out some relevant material due to space limitations. A full review will have the advantage of more freedom to cover in detail the complexities of a particular scientific development, but may then be left in the pile of the very important papers “to be read” by readers with little time to spare for major monographs.

There is probably a continuum between mini- and full reviews. The same point applies to the dichotomy of descriptive vs. integrative reviews. While descriptive reviews focus on the methodology, findings, and interpretation of each reviewed study, integrative reviews attempt to find common ideas and concepts from the reviewed material [12] . A similar distinction exists between narrative and systematic reviews: while narrative reviews are qualitative, systematic reviews attempt to test a hypothesis based on the published evidence, which is gathered using a predefined protocol to reduce bias [13] , [14] . When systematic reviews analyse quantitative results in a quantitative way, they become meta-analyses. The choice between different review types will have to be made on a case-by-case basis, depending not just on the nature of the material found and the preferences of the target journal(s), but also on the time available to write the review and the number of coauthors [15] .

Rule 5: Keep the Review Focused, but Make It of Broad Interest

Whether your plan is to write a mini- or a full review, it is good advice to keep it focused 16 , 17 . Including material just for the sake of it can easily lead to reviews that are trying to do too many things at once. The need to keep a review focused can be problematic for interdisciplinary reviews, where the aim is to bridge the gap between fields [18] . If you are writing a review on, for example, how epidemiological approaches are used in modelling the spread of ideas, you may be inclined to include material from both parent fields, epidemiology and the study of cultural diffusion. This may be necessary to some extent, but in this case a focused review would only deal in detail with those studies at the interface between epidemiology and the spread of ideas.

While focus is an important feature of a successful review, this requirement has to be balanced with the need to make the review relevant to a broad audience. This square may be circled by discussing the wider implications of the reviewed topic for other disciplines.

Rule 6: Be Critical and Consistent

Reviewing the literature is not stamp collecting. A good review does not just summarize the literature, but discusses it critically, identifies methodological problems, and points out research gaps [19] . After having read a review of the literature, a reader should have a rough idea of:

• the major achievements in the reviewed field,
• the main areas of debate, and
• the outstanding research questions.

It is challenging to achieve a successful review on all these fronts. A solution can be to involve a set of complementary coauthors: some people are excellent at mapping what has been achieved, some others are very good at identifying dark clouds on the horizon, and some have instead a knack at predicting where solutions are going to come from. If your journal club has exactly this sort of team, then you should definitely write a review of the literature! In addition to critical thinking, a literature review needs consistency, for example in the choice of passive vs. active voice and present vs. past tense.

Rule 7: Find a Logical Structure

Like a well-baked cake, a good review has a number of telling features: it is worth the reader's time, timely, systematic, well written, focused, and critical. It also needs a good structure. With reviews, the usual subdivision of research papers into introduction, methods, results, and discussion does not work or is rarely used. However, a general introduction of the context and, toward the end, a recapitulation of the main points covered and take-home messages make sense also in the case of reviews. For systematic reviews, there is a trend towards including information about how the literature was searched (database, keywords, time limits) [20] .

How can you organize the flow of the main body of the review so that the reader will be drawn into and guided through it? It is generally helpful to draw a conceptual scheme of the review, e.g., with mind-mapping techniques. Such diagrams can help recognize a logical way to order and link the various sections of a review [21] . This is the case not just at the writing stage, but also for readers if the diagram is included in the review as a figure. A careful selection of diagrams and figures relevant to the reviewed topic can be very helpful to structure the text too [22] .

Rule 8: Make Use of Feedback

Reviews of the literature are normally peer-reviewed in the same way as research papers, and rightly so [23] . As a rule, incorporating feedback from reviewers greatly helps improve a review draft. Having read the review with a fresh mind, reviewers may spot inaccuracies, inconsistencies, and ambiguities that had not been noticed by the writers due to rereading the typescript too many times. It is however advisable to reread the draft one more time before submission, as a last-minute correction of typos, leaps, and muddled sentences may enable the reviewers to focus on providing advice on the content rather than the form.

Feedback is vital to writing a good review, and should be sought from a variety of colleagues, so as to obtain a diversity of views on the draft. This may lead in some cases to conflicting views on the merits of the paper, and on how to improve it, but such a situation is better than the absence of feedback. A diversity of feedback perspectives on a literature review can help identify where the consensus view stands in the landscape of the current scientific understanding of an issue [24] .

Rule 9: Include Your Own Relevant Research, but Be Objective

In many cases, reviewers of the literature will have published studies relevant to the review they are writing. This could create a conflict of interest: how can reviewers report objectively on their own work [25] ? Some scientists may be overly enthusiastic about what they have published, and thus risk giving too much importance to their own findings in the review. However, bias could also occur in the other direction: some scientists may be unduly dismissive of their own achievements, so that they will tend to downplay their contribution (if any) to a field when reviewing it.

In general, a review of the literature should neither be a public relations brochure nor an exercise in competitive self-denial. If a reviewer is up to the job of producing a well-organized and methodical review, which flows well and provides a service to the readership, then it should be possible to be objective in reviewing one's own relevant findings. In reviews written by multiple authors, this may be achieved by assigning the review of the results of a coauthor to different coauthors.

Rule 10: Be Up-to-Date, but Do Not Forget Older Studies

Given the progressive acceleration in the publication of scientific papers, today's reviews of the literature need awareness not just of the overall direction and achievements of a field of inquiry, but also of the latest studies, so as not to become out-of-date before they have been published. Ideally, a literature review should not identify as a major research gap an issue that has just been addressed in a series of papers in press (the same applies, of course, to older, overlooked studies (“sleeping beauties” [26] )). This implies that literature reviewers would do well to keep an eye on electronic lists of papers in press, given that it can take months before these appear in scientific databases. Some reviews declare that they have scanned the literature up to a certain point in time, but given that peer review can be a rather lengthy process, a full search for newly appeared literature at the revision stage may be worthwhile. Assessing the contribution of papers that have just appeared is particularly challenging, because there is little perspective with which to gauge their significance and impact on further research and society.

Inevitably, new papers on the reviewed topic (including independently written literature reviews) will appear from all quarters after the review has been published, so that there may soon be the need for an updated review. But this is the nature of science [27] – [32] . I wish everybody good luck with writing a review of the literature.

Acknowledgments

Many thanks to M. Barbosa, K. Dehnen-Schmutz, T. Döring, D. Fontaneto, M. Garbelotto, O. Holdenrieder, M. Jeger, D. Lonsdale, A. MacLeod, P. Mills, M. Moslonka-Lefebvre, G. Stancanelli, P. Weisberg, and X. Xu for insights and discussions, and to P. Bourne, T. Matoni, and D. Smith for helpful comments on a previous draft.

• 1. Rapple C (2011) The role of the critical review article in alleviating information overload. Annual Reviews White Paper. Available: http://www.annualreviews.org/userimages/ContentEditor/1300384004941/Annual_Reviews_WhitePaper_Web_2011.pdf . Accessed May 2013.
• View Article
• Google Scholar
• 7. Budgen D, Brereton P (2006) Performing systematic literature reviews in software engineering. Proc 28th Int Conf Software Engineering, ACM New York, NY, USA, pp. 1051–1052. doi: https://doi.org/10.1145/1134285.1134500 .
• 16. Eco U (1977) Come si fa una tesi di laurea. Milan: Bompiani.
• 17. Hart C (1998) Doing a literature review: releasing the social science research imagination. London: SAGE.
• 21. Ridley D (2008) The literature review: a step-by-step guide for students. London: SAGE.

An official website of the United States government

The .gov means it’s official. Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

The site is secure. The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

• Publications
• Account settings
• Advanced Search
• Journal List
• Pak J Med Sci
• v.39(2); Mar-Apr 2023
• PMC10025746

Systematic Review Reporting - Writing concisely and precisely

Patrick fw chien.

1 Patrick FW Chien, FRCOGm, Department of Obstetrics & Gynaecology, RCSI & UCD Malaysia Campus, 10450 Penang, Malaysia

Khalid S Khan

2 Khalid S Khan, FRCOG, Department of Preventive Medicine and Public Health, University of Granada, Faculty of Medicine, Granada, Spain. CIBER Epidemiology and Public Health, Madrid, Spain

Systematic reviews rank at the top of the evidence hierarchy. Concise writing implies drafting the systematic review article succinctly, i.e. using as few words to express as full an extent of the research effort as possible. Precise writing means drafting the text with accuracy especially with respect to the methodological and statistical aspects. The Abstract ought to be succinct and structured to allow for editors, peer reviewers and readers to get the gist of the key aspects of the systematic review with a quick read. The readership needs to be able to critically appraisal systematic reviews for their internal and external validity rapidly. The Abstract also needs to be standalone, representing an independent summary that can be fully understood without the need for reading the full paper. The standard structure of the main text of a scientific article called IMRaD (Introduction, Methods, Results and Discussion) applies equally to systematic reviews in the same way as it does to any other kinds of research manuscripts whether related to laboratory experiments or clinical trials. Restricting the word count limits to those imposed by journals may at first seem difficult, even unfair, to systematic reviewers. However, with the availability of online appendices to transparently and fully report the details of the methods, results and other aspects of the work undertaken allows for a succinct print or PDF article. Writing a shorter manuscript is more effortful than writing a longer report. This commentary is aimed at novice systematic reviewers to help them learn the written and unwritten writing rules in order to assist them in producing impactful publications to support evidence-based medicine.

INTRODUCTION

Information generated from a well conducted systematic review provides the highest level of evidence to guide clinical practice. 1 There has been an increased number of systematic reviews being published in biomedical journals in recent times (according to PubMed, over 40,000 last year). 2 , 3 Hence, it is important that such manuscripts are written in an easily understandable style to allow the clinical effectiveness information to be disseminated effectively. Besides the use of clear and understandable language, manuscripts of systematic reviews also need to be written in a structured manner in the same way as an original research article is drafted for easier comprehension. 4 - 6

Journal editors are keen for systematic review papers to be written as concisely and precisely as possible. Manuscripts of systematic reviews can be lengthy due to the enormous amount of information generated in this type of research. The tables summarising the included and excluded studies and the figures showing the study quality and forest plots of meta-analyses can be extensive, taking up many print pages of a journal. It is also important that relevant information pertaining to the design and conduct of a systematic review is reported in the manuscript in order for the internal validity of the findings to be accepted.

Hence, the challenge here is for these articles to provide the relevant information documenting accurately with as little print space as possible. Concise writing implies drafting the systematic review article succinctly, i.e. using few words to express the full extent of the research effort. Precise writing means drafting the text with accuracy especially with respect to the methodological and statistical aspects. For concise and precise writing, scientific terms should be used with specific meaning as shown in Table-I . For example, the term ‘meta-analysis’, which is merely a statistical analysis, should not be conflated with the term ‘systematic review’, which may or may not include meta-analysis. Lack of this precision in drafting text makes for confusion and misinterpretation. 7

Understanding basic research terminology deployed in writing systematic reviews precisely.

Terms and precise meanings taken from: Khan KS, Zamora J. Systematic Reviews to support Evidence-Based Medicine. How to appraise conduct and publish reviews. 3rd Edition. (ISBN 9781032114675) London: Taylor & Francis Publishing 2022.

At the present moment, some of the systematic review articles are too long, with important information omitted or irrelevant data reported or even inaccurate titles. 7 There may also be a lack of universally agreed structure in the reporting of such articles, as there are misperceptions about the originality of systematic reviews. 8 The journals also differ in their word count limitations, e.g. the Cochrane Library reviews can be lengthy but the traditional journal article does not permit such excessive length. It is common for young researchers to undertake the systematic reviews as part of their postgraduate theses and these are also often reported in a peer review journal.

Such articles are sometimes submitted to journals in a version similar to that in the thesis chapter without taking into consideration that the readership for the version published in a biomedical journal is different to that for a postgraduate thesis. Writing a shorter article takes more effort than writing a longer manuscript, and it takes longer. The additional effort made by systematic review authors in drafting their manuscripts concisely and precisely is going to be appreciated by editors, peer reviewers and readers alike.

The purpose of this commentary is to provide some advice and guidance to novice researchers on the reporting of the findings of a systematic review for publication in a biomedical journal. Hopefully, new systematic reviewers can gain awareness of the written and unwritten publication rules we provide here in order to make it easier for their manuscripts to be accepted for publication on the first submission, reducing the time wasted in the rejection-resubmission cycle.

Converting a thesis chapter into a journal article the initial steps:

The initial step is to adhere to the instructions to authors of the journal where the article is to be submitted. Different biomedical journals have different manuscript formatting requirements and word count limits on the manuscript length. There may also be limitations on the number of tables and figures which are permitted to be used in the print manuscript, these days produced as a PDF file. In this manner, publishers wish to ensure that the relevant information is provided at the minimum cost related to printing and electronic production. They are quite happy for the information that is not available in the printed manuscript to be provided as supplementary materials in appendices.

Prospective registration:

Ideally, all systematic reviews should be prospectively registered in order to avoid unnecessary duplication of the same work by different research groups. 6 , 9 Such registration is also encouraged to allow verification that the original systematic review protocol has been followed and any subsequent deviation from this protocol are fully reported with justifications in the published manuscript for the purpose of transparency. 10 Hence, details of the registration should also be provided in the manuscript. There are many registration platforms e.g. Prospero ( https://www.crd.york.ac.uk/prospero/ ) and OSF ( https://accounts.osf.io/ ).

Avoiding plagiarism:

There is also a need to avoid plagiarism, i.e. presenting text as your own that is not an identical copy of previously published text. This is important given that the issues discussed in the systematic review manuscript may be similar to those in the included primary studies. 11 You may be able to carry out an electronic plagiarism check to ensure that the similarity index is acceptably low before the manuscript is submitted for publication. 12 Paraphrasing and using quotations with references to the original sources protect against allegation of plagiarism. Most journals would carry out automated plagiarism checks, using artificial intelligence software programmes such as CrossCheck or iThenticate, and reject manuscript without peer review if large chunks of text are copied from other sources.

Reporting checklists:

Journals also require submission of reporting checklists describing how the manuscript has been complied with guidance on transparent reporting. There are many checklists used to report systematic reviews and quality assessment tools, e.g. PRISMA 6 , MOOSE 13 , PRISMA-P 14 , GRIPP-2 15 , PRIOR 16 , AMSTAR 17 , ROBIS 18 , etc. We have provided a summary of these in Table-II . These checklists are intended to improve the quality of reporting of systematic reviews and peer reviewers often refer to these resources when assessing your papers.

Checklists for transparent reporting, appraisal and concise of systematic reviews.

The Abstract of a systematic review:

The most important section of the manuscript is the Abstract as editors and peer reviewers as well as most general readership tend to scrutinise this part of the manuscript in the first instance. As the adage goes ‘a good first impression makes a lasting impression’. The Abstract is such an important element of the manuscript that we would advise not to leave writing the Abstract to the last moment before submission; we advise you to write it first and keep on revising it as you write the main text of your manuscript. Nowadays, it is common to employ a structured abstract with different subheadings on the Objective, Methods, Results and Conclusion. 6

This is complementary to the structure of the main text and allows for the initially drafted Abstract to serve as a building block for the writing of the main text. Only the main findings and conclusion should be reported in the Abstract in order to the core message to be understood easily and quickly. Prospective registration details should also be provided in the Abstract. Beware that the Abstract needs to be able to standalone, being fully interpretable without the need for referring to the main article text.

Structured manuscript of a systematic review:

Generally, the main text for such manuscripts should be written with the same structure as that used for original articles, i.e. Introduction, Methods, Results and Discussion, or IMRaD for short. 19 You can include subheadings in the Methods, Results and Discussion sections in order to write systematically, avoiding duplications ( Table-III ).

A systematic review manuscript structure.

Adpated from: Khan KS, Zamora J. Systematic Reviews to support Evidence-Based Medicine. How to appraise conduct and publish reviews. 3rd Edition. (ISBN 9781032114675) London: Taylor & Francis Publishing 2022.

The Introduction should describe the clinical problem being addressed in the article and its importance. A paragraph to justify the rationale for undertaking the systematic review should be presented here. If a similar review has been published previously, the Introduction should explain the need for an update, e.g. there may have been new, large studies published since the last review. There may be many reviews published on the topic, so inevitably previous reviews would need to be critically appraised. The Introduction doesn’t really permit a detailed appraisal description, so an appendix tabulating the critique of the previous reviews using e.g. AMSTAR-2 or ROBIS tools can be supplemented.

To end the Introduction section, the authors should explicitly state the research question based on a structured format with the health outcomes defined a priori. Core outcomes, the minimum set of critical and important outcomes on which there is consensus regarding clinical relevance among patients and practitioners 20 , offer a focus for the main article, leaving non-core outcome data for reporting in appendices. Editors use the information provided in the Introduction to determine if the submission should be given priority over other manuscripts they have in front of them.

The Methods should start by giving the prospective registration details and the reporting checklists used. The structured question forms the basis of the search strategy. The search term combination and the databases searched with dates need to be reported in a reproducible manner. 21 The inclusion and exclusion criteria for articles to be used in or omitted from the systematic review should be also reported. 6 The instrument used for the assessment of study quality and the method of data extraction should be reported as well as the assessment on how any disagreement between the systematic reviewers was resolved. 6

The level of agreement between the systematic reviewers should also be assessed and reported. The statistical method for pooling data, subgroup analysis, sensitivity analysis and assessment of publication bias also have to be reported in the manuscript. 6 If there has been public involvement 24 in the review, this should also be reported in the Methods. Importantly, if there have been modifications to the systematic review since its registration, e.g. if the nature changed to scoping review in light of the emerging findings during the review work, these should be justified in the Methods section openly.

The descriptions of the literature searches, the lists of included and excluded articles along with the reasons for such decisions, the details of data extraction methods and study quality assessment can take up too much space. This is where supplementary appendices giving the search strategy, excluded studies with reasons, the data extraction and quality assessment checklist help with completeness of reporting. Peer reviewers and readers can further scrutinise these details if they wish.

The Results section should incorporate a flow chart on the search and subsequent inclusion and exclusion of articles into the systematic review with a brief description of the included articles. The information on the included studies allows the peer reviewers and readers to determine the comprehensiveness of the literature search and also the level of external validity of the findings from the review. The findings of the study quality assessment should be then described in order for the peer reviewers and readers to determine the robustness of the evidence from the review. These can be succinctly presented in a figure using 100% stacked bar chart, providing the actual number of studies with particular features within the bars (easily constructed in a spreadsheet).

To conserve space, tables of individual study characteristics and quality can be provided in appendices. The main findings on the primary outcome(s) should be reported followed by the findings based on the secondary outcomes. Forrest plots should be provided for at least the primary outcome(s) together with assessment on possible heterogeneity in the pooled data. Results of any sensitivity or subgroup analyses together with the assessment of possible publication bias also should be briefly reported. 6

Again, all the outputs from such analyses should be provided as appendices so that they can be scrutinised by those who wish to ensure integrity of the review. Appendices, tables and figures should have titles with sufficient details to permit them to standalone and assist in understanding their contents without the need to refer to the Abstract or the main text. Any additional results tables and figures which may not be permitted to be published in the PDF version of the manuscript should be available as supplementary material. In this way, the systematic review can be fully presented without taking up an unacceptably high amount print space for the accepted article.

The Discussion section should generally consist of no more than 4-5 paragraphs. The main findings of the systematic review and any clinical implications to clinical practice should be summarised in the first paragraph (without repeating the numerical data presented in the Results section). This is followed by a discussion of the strengths and limitations of the systematic review in the next paragraphs. The subsequent paragraph should address the interpretation of the findings in relation to other previously published reviews on the same topic. Any interpretation of findings may cover the issue of cost effectiveness briefly even though this may not be the main focus of the systematic review.

The implications for clinical practice and future research should then be described here as well. The last paragraph should provide the conclusion of the systematic review based only on the findings concerning the primary outcome(s) determined a priori as stated in the Introduction section. Authors should avoid overstating the conclusion of the review, especially e.g. in situations when data from observational studies are pooled together with randomised trials and there is significant heterogeneity in the results.

Integrity and transparency:

The roles and contributions of the authors 22 , all potential conflicts of interest 6 , acknowledgement(s), sources of funding 23 , etc. should also be reported to meet the openness agenda that is critical to public trust in science. The interest of transparency in reporting is served by providing the above in full detail using the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors criteria and forms (ICMJE; http://www.icmje.org ), supplied as appendices if required. Reporting checklists should be provided as an appendix to explicitly demonstrate how and where the article complies, or justifiably not comply, with the requirements for transparent reporting.

Dealing with peer review comments:

In dealing with peer review comments, it is important that responses should be submitted within the time period given by the editors dealing with the submission. If this is not possible for any reason, authors should contact the journal office to request for time extension. The request should be justified. Frequently the need to respond to peer review may require update searches and the editors will understand and accept if this was the reason for the extension requested. Each comment will need to be itemised with an appropriate response and any change in the manuscript highlighted in order for the editor to be able to be easily assess and track the changes made to the manuscript. Editors may request the original peer reviewers to address the responses you provide.

It is important to candidly acknowledge any limitations of the systematic review highlighted by the peer reviewers and to include (where possible) any additional information into the manuscript. If there are too many comments, as is the case when there are many peer reviewers, tabulation of responses is most helpful in demonstrating that that critique received has been addressed in a structured and comprehensive manner. 25 Beware that the response to editors’ and peer reviewers’ comments need to be detailed in order for it to be convincing. The arguments made may have to be backed by references and scientific explanations.

There may be difference of opinion over how particular issues should be handled, e.g. heterogeneity is not always easily explained and there may be unexplained heterogeneity that is unavoidable. It may require you to write quite a long table of responses. The response document may in fact be longer than the manuscript itself in some circumstances. Authors need to be concise and precise in responding too but there are not rigid word limits applied in the same way as those applied to manuscripts. In the future it is likely the peer review will be openly published to maximise transparency, and going forward responses to peer review comments and the original and revised manuscripts will all be publicly available. 26

Writing concisely and precisely is effortful and time-consuming. Editors, peer reviewers and readers need to be able to critically appraisal systematic reviews for their internal and external validity rapidly. It is important that systematic reviews, even when written within word count limits, can be fully understood so that the data from such work can be used to shape clinical practice and policy. A structured Abstract, mimicking the main text structure, is the key to writing convincingly. The standard structure of the main text of a paper, abbreviated in the acronym IMRaD, applies equally to systematic reviews as it does to any other kinds of research types including laboratory experiments and clinical trials. By reporting the systematic review findings in a succinct manuscript, accompanied with details transparently and completely presented in supplementary files, the data collated can be accurately presented to ensure that critical appraisal and assimilation of evidence into practice is facilitated.

Authors’ Contribution:

PFWC: Wrote, edited and approved the manuscript.

KSK: Edited and approved the manuscript.

Grant Support & Financial Disclosures: None for PFWC. KSK is a distinguished investigator at the University of Granada funded by the Beatriz Galindo (senior modality) program of the Spanish Ministry of Education.

Reference to Published Sources of Information

Present Perfect Tense is often used when the focus of the work is on several authors.

Present Perfect Tense may also be used when you want to refer to how much or how little research has been carried out on a particular topic.

Present Tense is often used to refer to generally accepted scientific facts.

Modal Verbs may be used if you wish to introduce a degree of tentativeness into your comments about the work of an author. In this situation the reporting verb will be in the passive voice and the addition of a modal verb will indicate the degree of confidence attributed to the information.

How Long Should A Literature Review Be In A 10000 Word Dissertation?

A dissertation, if put in simple words, is an elongated version of a research paper. Being a research paper, a dissertation consists of more or less the same chapters and components, which differ by their depth of research and the word count, of course.

Table of Contents

What are the main chapters of a dissertation?

• Introduction : a brief intro of the topic or research problem, detailing the research question, thesis statement and research aims along with background of the topic.
• Literature Review : a critical review of the existing literature available on the topic.
• Methodologies : a description of the methods utilised in performing the research.
• Analysis/Findings : an understanding of the findings and their subsequent analysis.
• Conclusion : the ending of the dissertation, summing up the entire research with its justification, background and reinstatement of the research question.

In this article, we are going to lay an emphasis on the Literature Review chapter and explain how you can craft it better.

But first….Let Us Tell You How a Dissertation is divided!

To answer your question ‘how long should a literature review be in a 10,000 word dissertation’, the answer is 3,000 words. If you are wondering as to how we came to this figure, it is easy to understand that a literature review covers 30% of the total word count in a dissertation.

Therefore, for a dissertation that stretches up to 10,000 words, the 30% of it comes around to 3,000 words.

For your ease, we have listed down the breakdown of a dissertation in terms of word count percentage.

The findings/analysis can be separated into Findings/Results and Analysis/Discussions/ While doing this, you can consider 5% for the Findings/Results section while the Analysis/Discussions section makes up for the 30% of the word count.

Note : Please remember that this is a general and tentative breakdown and can vary from institute to institute. You will have to confirm from your university regarding the set percentage and make sure that you are aware of the given guidelines. Dissertation Writing Help can draft the specific guideline set according to your institute’s requirements.

How to Write a Dissertation Literature Review? What Is Its Importance?

As stated in the introduction of this article, a Literature Review consists of the critical review of all kinds of literature that is available on the topic. However, that’s only a one-line summary of it. In reality, it constitutes about 30% of your entire dissertation and makes up the most of your research.

You have to read across different literature that already exists and go through what others have written about your particular topic. As such, you can say that the literature review is based on secondary sources and does not concern any new discovery.

What does a literature review involve?

• Updated and accurate material regarding the topic
• In-depth reading and summarising of key points
• A synthesis of the key points, concepts and theories
• Evaluation of the concepts, theories and key points
• Identification of the areas that can be debated upon

How to choose the material for research?

While narrowing down the proper stuff for conducting your research, you need to keep in mind the following characteristics:

• The specific topic, focus and question of your assignment.
• The kind of material you shall require, such as theories, policies, empirical data and methodologies.
• The type of literature that is available such as journals, research articles, books etc.
• The kind of literature that stands dominant in the field of study.
• The room for research the topic offers.
• The availability of good-enough samples for reference.
• The consideration of alternative points of view.
• The relevancy and degree of appropriation of the literature review with the audience

In the age of the internet, researching has become easier in a manner but complex too in the parallel, since students need to cut down the irrelevant and inaccurate sources too. It is always good to have some literature review samples by your side to reference, such as work done by some seniors on the same topic.

While researching, you as a student need to ensure that the topic neither becomes too broad or too specific, otherwise, your research will suffer in both cases.

A very important point that students often miss out on is that they do not consider the point of view of the audience. If the dissertation does not strike well to the reader, then it will fail to make an impact on the reader anyway, thus not securing appreciation. As such, the writing part should be done while keeping the reader in the mind too.

How to structure and write your literature review?

When you are writing a literature review for a dissertation UK based, you need to make sure that you follow the given format properly. You have to build your literature review around your key topic and be specific about the challenges and contributions it has.

Outline the strategy, present the topic theme and analyse all that you have studied and included in your core research. Do use your own voice but use evidence while making your claims and do not jot down any argument without any data. In the end, do not forget to proofread and edit!

If It Still Does Not Help, Hire Our Literature Review Writing Service

Writing a literature review all by yourself, especially if you do not have the experience or knowledge in doing so, can prove to be difficult and may put you under a lot of stress. It is always good to solicit assistance from someone who knows very well about the domain.

In such a circumstance, you can hire our Literature Review Writing Service that will resolve all of your literature review issues. We have a huge panel of writers who belong to different fields and have a substantial amount of experience in the research and writing field.

To find out more, all you have to do is get in touch with our customer support team through Live Chat, phone or email, as you please. Get started right away!

Disclaimer: Kindly note that the work we provide is not the final version, it is research based work which you have to incorporate and edit according to your university requirements.

Training videos   |   Faqs

Academic Phrases for Writing Literature Review Section of a Research Paper

Overview |   Abstract   | Introduction | Literature Review | Materials & Methods | Results & Discussion | Conclusion & Future Work | Acknowledgements & Appendix

The literature review should clearly demonstrate that the author has a good knowledge of the research area. Literature review typically occupies one or two passages in the introduction section. A well-written literature review should provide a critical appraisal of previous studies related to the current research area rather than a simple summary of prior works. The author shouldn’t shy away from pointing out the shortcomings of previous works. However, criticising other’s work without any basis can weaken your paper. This is a perfect place to coin your research question and justify the need for such a study. It is also worth pointing out towards the end of the review that your study is unique and there is no direct literature addressing this issue. Add a few sentences about the significance of your research and how this will add value to the body of knowledge.

The literature review section of your research paper should include the following:

• Previous literature
• Limitations of previous research
• Research questions
• Research to be explored

1. Previous literature

The literature review shows that __ Previous research showed __ Seminal contributions have been made by __ A series of recent studies has indicated that __ Several theories have been proposed to __, some focusing on __, others on __ There has been numerous studies to investigate __ This has been used in several studies to assess __ Previous studies have shown __ Several studies suggest that __ This has also been explored in prior studies by __ Prior research suggests that __ Previous studies have emphasized __ The majority of prior research has applied __ Most early studies as well as current work focus on __ For instance, the following studies were conducted on __ Studies of __are well documented, it is also well acknowledged that __ A number of authors have recognized __ Some authors have also suggested that  __ Some authors have driven the further development of __ This has been discussed by a great number of authors in literature. For example, research has provided evidence for __ The authors bring some information about the background of the problem, __ As has been previously reported in the literature, __ A large number of existing studies in the broader literature have examined __ The literature review shows that __ There exists a considerable body of literature on  __ In short, the literature pertaining to __ strongly suggests that __ Over time, an extensive literature has developed on __ This section presents a review of recent literature on __ This paper begins with a short review of the literature regarding the __ Several methods are reported in the literature to address this issue. There is a wide choice of __ available in the literature. This section reviews the literature related to __ It was reported in literature that __ A recent study by __ concluded that __ In the light of reported __ it is conceivable that __ The method introduced by __ has the advantage that __ One method employed by __ is __ A more comprehensive description can be found in __ For example, recent research suggests that __ This was successfully established as described by __ The author employed a __ methodology which prescribes the use of __

2. Limitations of previous research

A number of questions regarding __ remain to be addressed. A closer look to the literature on __, however, reveals a number of gaps and shortcomings. This question has previously never been addressed because__ Most studies have relied on __ Previous studies by __ cannot be considered as conclusive because __ Previous studies have almost exclusively focused on __ This has been previously assessed only to a very limited extent because __ In the present studies __ were constrained to __ In previous studies were limited to __ Although results appear consistent with prior research, they appear inconsistent with __ These are previously unstudied because __ As far as we know, no previous research has investigated __ Moreover, although research has illuminated __ no study to date has examined __ Despite decades of research, this continues to be debated among __ This section points out some of the problems encountered in the extant research. Although there are many studies, the research in __ remains limited. However, the existing research has many problems in representing __ The literature on __ is less consistent Historically, there has been a great deal of confusion in the literature regarding __ This approach remains briefly addressed in the literature. These are rarely analyzed in the literature as __ There are key questions and notions that are still not discussed in the literature __ This is not clearly presented in the literature because __ This paper addresses the need for __, so far lacking in the scientific literature. To fill this literature gap, this paper identifies __ Only a few works in literature demonstrate __ Although studies have been conducted by many authors, this problem is still insufficiently explored. To our knowledge, no prior studies have examined __ However, the existing research has many problems in __ Therefore, important issue in the literature is __ However, we argue that previous literature suffers from certain weaknesses: __ Previous research can only be considered a first step towards a more profound understanding of __ The previous studies reveal that __ are usually the most problematic to __

3. Research questions

More specific research questions will be introduced and investigated in __ A further question is whether __ Finally, another promising line of research would be __ The study addresses several further questions on __ Some of the interesting questions in this context are __ In order to address the questions outlined above, we report here __ These questions are of central interest as much recent research in __ Furthermore, __ is arguably an important question to be addressed. The question now is how __ can be used to explain __ Study addresses the research question __ In order to properly address this question, we __ An important question associated with __ is __ A critical open question is whether __ A still unsolved question is whether __ This remains an open question as __ This question has previously never been addressed because __ This study offers a test of __ research question Study addresses the research question __ Even in general __ research strategies is needed to explain __ The researcher should be interested here in __ Many questions remain unanswered __ There are some potentially open questions about the validity of __ The question that then naturally arises is __ The question then becomes how best to define__ This was an important question to study as __

4. Research to be explored

A more systematic and theoretical analysis is required for __ As the authors note earlier, more work is necessary to__ Additional studies to understand more completely the key tenets of __ are required. The unexpected findings signal the need for additional studies to understand more about __ This paper addresses __, so far lacking in the scientific literature. A new approach is therefore needed for __ One of the tough challenges for all researchers in this domain is __

Similar Posts

Useful Phrases and Sentences for Academic & Research Paper Writing

In this blog, we explain various sections of a research paper and give you an overview of what these sections should contain.

Academic Phrases for Writing Introduction Section of a Research Paper

In this blog, we discuss phrases related to introduction section such as opening statement, problem definition and research aims.

Academic Phrases for Writing Results & Discussion Sections of a Research Paper

In this blog, we discuss phrases related to results and discussion sections such as findings, limitations, arguments, and comparison to previous studies.

Academic Phrases for Writing Acknowledgements & Appendix Sections of a Research Paper

In this blog, we discuss phrases related to thanking colleagues, acknowledging funders and writing the appendix section.

Academic Writing Resources – Academic PhraseBank | Academic Vocabulary & Word Lists

In this blog, we review various academic writing resources such as academic phrasebank, academic wordlists, academic vocabulary training sites.

Academic Phrases for Writing Methods Section of a Research Paper

In this blog, we discuss phrases related to materials and methods such as experimental setup, data collection & analysis, and statistical testing.

26 Comments

this helps and appreciate it. !

Thank you so much. This is very helpful

thanks mate

I have read and appreciated the content,very useful and academically well outlined.

Thank you! It’s very helpful!

Thank you. I find this helpful.

Thanks. it is very helpful

can such phrases be tracked as plagiarism? if yes, then what is left for the researchers to put on their paper?

Very helpful..Thanks

Good on you

Very useful! With this, I will improve my writing style!

Thanks a lot. God bless you.

Very useful

Thank you for this site, it helps me a lot when writing my literature reviews for my Research Module

Valuable information, thank you.

l appreciate it. it is very helpfull academically

very very good propositions

Thanks! This is what I was looking for

really appreciate

how to purchase a premium version

Thank you Sir,

This is invaluable. I will study it closely and incorporate as per guidance.

Amazing contents and great help. Thank you!

Could I copy your free academic phrases handbook for my research? Thank you

Helpful, Thanks

Thank you for this great assistance

Veery Helpful

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.

• 0.1K Share Facebook
• 67 Share Twitter
• 82 Share LinkedIn
• 0.1K Share Email