A literature review is a section of a research paper that provides an overview of the topic under study. An important function of a literature review is to collect relevant information from all relevant sources relating to your research question, synthesize this information, and provide a comprehensive summary of the information. The goal is to provide enough background so that someone who does not know the topic can understand your research.
In a literature review, what is the length of each section?
The introduction is the first section of your paper, and it should include:
- A brief history of the topic.
- A definition of why this topic is important, including its relevance to other disciplines or areas of research (e.g., what questions it will help answer).
- How do you plan on answering these questions, including a discussion about how your study fits into the existing literature on the subject (i.e., what work has already been done).
- Sample size and selection process (if applicable)
- Methods used to collect data (e.g., surveys vs. interviews)
What should be the order of the sections and subsections?
If you’re writing a literature review, an introduction should give the reader some background on your topic and its importance. Then, you’ll want to discuss your research question and how it relates to what has been written in other studies on the same topic.
In this section, you can present the methods used in your study—how many participants were involved? How were they selected? What data collection tools did they use? How was the data analyzed and interpreted?
The next section should go into more detail about those results: what conclusions can we draw from them about our research question or hypothesis. It’s important here not just because someone may want to know more about something that happened but also because it allows us to see if these findings hold up under scrutiny from peers familiar with this study area. It’s also important because it sets up what happens next—discussion!
How do you go about writing a lit review when you have no idea what to write?
The first step to writing a lit review is deciding what you want to say. Choose a topic that interests you and will help you better understand the research process. Think about how your topic relates to other research in the field and how it can contribute to the body of knowledge on this subject.
It’s important not only to know what papers have been published on your topic but also how they are organized. Read through some literature review samples from different fields and note what types of information they include—this will help inform how yours should be structured as well as give ideas for where new researchers may be able to find more data (or not).
How do you conclude a literature review?
In the concluding section, you should summarize the main points of your research and state any new questions raised. Also, it is good to state how your findings contribute to existing knowledge and what future directions for research might be. Finally, you may want to say a few words about the limitations of your study and its implications for future research.
The format used here is not unique – it is just one example of how a literature review could look in one particular journal style (APA). The key is using an appropriate academic language style so that others can clearly understand what you are saying without having too much difficulty reading through what they might otherwise consider too many ‘academic’ terms or phrases!
Standards for writing a literature review.
There are standards for writing a literature review. The purpose of those standards is to ensure that your research paper clearly and accurately reflects the findings of previous research.
For readers to be able to understand your work, you must follow these standards in your literature review:
- The structure must make sense; it should not be confusing or hard to follow.
- Your reference lists should be complete and accurate, organized by author’s last name, then first initial in alphabetical order (e.g., Smith J).
- When citing other works, you need to use APA formatting guidelines so that they are easily recognized as citations rather than full-text quotes or paraphrases. On a side note, if you are a student and need written assignments, consult assignment help.
Conclusion
As a researcher, you need to have a solid understanding of the topic that you are working on. A literature review is an important part of this process because it allows you to look at all relevant research in one place and evaluate them. This helps guide your research while ensuring that your work is not redundant to others in the field.