A literature review provides an overview of previous research on a topic that critically evaluates, classifies, and compares what has already been published on a particular topic. It tells the story and history of your topic, as well as highlights emerging areas of study and poses questions about the gaps in the literature.
A lit review allows the author to synthesize and place context into the research and scholarly literature relevant to the topic. Most scholarly books and articles begin with a review or at least a short characterization of the literature as a way of laying the groundwork for the authors' thesis. For researchers, this can be a great way of identifying key papers on the topic.
4 Steps of a Lit Review
1) Developing a Topic
2) Searching the Literature
3) Narrowing the Scope
4) Synthesizing Prior Research.
Common questions students have:
This video provides a brief overview on how to write a literature review.
This work by the Reed College Library is licensed under a Creative Commons CC-BY Attribution 4.0 International License.
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