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• 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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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 .  

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How to Conduct a Literature Review (Health Sciences and Beyond)

• What is a Literature Review?
• Developing a Research Question

Selection Criteria

Inclusion criteria, exclusion criteria.

• Database Search
• Documenting Your Search
• Organize Key Findings
• Reference Management

You may want to think about criteria that will be used to select articles for your literature review based on your research question.  These are commonly known as  inclusion criteria  and  exclusion criteria .  Be aware that you may introduce bias into the final review if these are not used thoughtfully.

Inclusion criteria are the elements of an article that must be present in order for it to be eligible for inclusion in a literature review.  Some examples are:

• Included studies must have compared certain treatments
• Included studies must be experimental
• Included studies must have been published in the last 5 years

Exclusion criteria are the elements of an article that disqualify the study from inclusion in a literature review.  Some examples are:

• Study used an observational design
• Study used a qualitative methodology
• Study was published more than 5 years ago
• Study was published in a language other than English
• << Previous: Developing a Research Question
• Next: Databases >>
• Last Updated: Mar 15, 2024 12:22 PM
• URL: https://guides.library.vcu.edu/health-sciences-lit-review

Literature reviews

A literature review is a research task that finds, evaluates and discusses information on a particular topic. You need to analyse multiple texts, and discuss key ideas that you find in the reading.

A literature review may also identify gaps for further research. It is not a process of summarising texts separately – that is done in an annotated bibliography .

A good literature review should:

• be well researched, planned and structured
• discuss a relevant issue, problem or practice that relates to your subject
• explain why your chosen topic is important
• identify key ideas or themes in the literature
• synthesise these findings into thematic paragraphs, using sufficient citations and correct referencing
• demonstrate your understanding of the topic and develop your knowledge and evidence-based practice.

Literature reviews differ across disciplines, so use your assessment instructions and marking criteria as your ultimate guide.

7 steps for writing a literature review

1. analyse the task.

Read the assessment instructions and marking rubric carefully. Note how many sources you need to include in your literature review and any guidelines on selecting the literature.

Choose a topic that interests you. A topic that is important to you will help you stay focused.

2. Establish a clear research question

A good research question will help you narrow down your topic so that it is manageable. If your question is too broad, you may be overwhelmed by the reading. If it is too narrow, you won’t find enough literature.

3. Search for relevant literature

Use keywords from your research question to begin searching .

In the research question "What factors impact student learning when on nursing placement?", the keywords are: student, learning, nursing and placement.

4. Read and review the literature, and take notes

When reading the literature, consider the following:

• Is the article relevant to your topic? For journal articles, read the abstract. For other sources, scan quickly and discard if you can’t see anything useful.
• Who is the author/s and what is their expertise?
• Is the source credible and scholarly ? Use any evaluation tools provided by your subject.
• What is the main topic and what themes are discussed?

Pay attention to important information, such as the abstract, introduction, headings/subheadings, graphs/tables and conclusion.

Take notes using the  Cornell method  or a note-taking grid. Keeping notes that help you remember the content and relevance of each source is vital for writing a literature review.

• Example note-taking grid for a literature review [Word - 14KB]

5. Identify common themes or areas for further research

It's important to understand the relationships between the sources you've read. Look out for:

• themes:  what questions, ideas or topics recur across the literature? Where do authors agree or disagree?
• areas for further research:  what is missing from the literature? Are there any weaknesses?

6. Plan the structure of the literature review

Before you start writing, plan how your literature review will be organised.

Literature reviews are usually organised thematically, meaning they discuss one theme after another. You can also organise your ideas chronologically (from past to present) or by methodology (e.g. comparing findings from qualitative and quantitative research).

7. Write, edit, proofread, submit

It's easy to get lost in the reading and not leave enough time for polishing your writing. Use the Assessment Planner to make a clear study plan that includes time for writing, editing and proofreading.

Structure of a literature review

Introduction.

The introduction should include:

• context or background : give a brief summary of the context for your research question and explain why it is important
• purpose (thesis statement): state the purpose of the literature review. This is a statement generated from the research question
• scope (roadmap):  outline the specific themes the literature review will focus on and give the reader a sense of how your writing is organised.

Each body paragraph focuses on a specific theme and draws on several pieces of literature. 

Paragraphs should include:

• topic sentence:  start with the theme of the paragraph
• synthesis of evidence:  make connections between multiple sources by comparing and contrasting their views. Use summaries, paraphrases and quotes , and don't forget to properly reference your sources
• analysis or evaluation: add your own interpretation of the findings and comment on any strengths, weaknesses, gaps or areas for further research in the literature
• link:  end the paragraph by either linking back to your main topic or to the following paragraph.

Conclusions should include:

• restate the purpose of the review
• summary of the main findings : remind your reader of the main points. Make sure you paraphrase your ideas, so you don’t use the same wording as elsewhere in the literature review
• implications of the findings: suggest how the findings might be important for practice in your field
• areas for further research : provide suggestions for future research to address the problem, issue or question.

The conclusion is followed by a Reference list or Bibliography. Consult the Style notes  page of the  Academic Referencing Tool  for examples.

For complete sample literature reviews with further annotations, see the Word and PDF documents below.

• Example Literature Review - Allied Health [PDF 245KB]
• Example Literature Review - Allied Health [Word 69KB]
• Example Literature Review - Education [PDF 283KB]
• Example Literature Review - Education [Word 104KB]

Further resources

• Using a reading to choose a research topic worksheet
• Manchester Academic Phrasebank - Phrases for academic writing and reporting on research
• Turn a stack of papers into a literature review: Useful tool for beginners (Journal article)

Pathfinder link

Still have questions? Do you want to talk to an expert? Peer Learning Advisors or Academic Skills and Language Advisors  are available.

Cant R., Ryan, C., Hughes, L., Luders, E., & Cooper, S. (2021). What helps, what hinders? Undergraduate nursing students’ perceptions of clinical placements based on a thematic synthesis of literature. SAGE Open Nursing, 7, 1-20.  https://doi.org/10.1177/23779608211035845 Adapted and used under CC BY-NC 4.0 license

• << Previous: Annotated bibliographies
• Next: Presentations >>

Literature Review: Understanding a Literature Review

• Understanding a Literature Review
• First Steps of the Research Process
• Locating Sources
• Writing the Literature Review
• Managing and Citing Your Sources

What is a literature review?

The literature review is a survey of information found in scholarly articles, books, and other sources directly related to a field of study. The goal of a literature review is to find, describe, summarize, evaluate and clarify prior research already published about your topic. A good literature review goes beyond summing up the research of others: it explores the literature for key concepts and determines what has already been investigated. In essence, a literature review identifies, defines and measures key concepts related to research already completed in the field of study.

A literature review:

• explains background of research on a topic
• demonstrates why a topic is significant
• describes, summarizes, evaluates, clarifies and integrates information on your project 
• places your project into the context of established work 
• identifies critical gaps, points of disagreement, or potentially flawed methodology
• provides a description, summary, and critical evaluation of significant works 
• indicates potential directions for future research

Books to Help

Types of Reviews

Different projects require different types of literature reviews.  While the basics outlined above remain the same, the length and kind of review will vary by the project.  Types of projects that require literature reviews:

• URI Grant Proposal
• Research Paper
• Master's Thesis
• Research Article

What Isn't a Literature Review?

A literature review sets the stage for later research.  It is NOT an annotated bibliography in which you summarize each article that you have reviewed.  A literature review focuses on a critical analysis of the reviewed works and their relationship to your research.

• Next: Developing the Literature Review >>
• Last Updated: Oct 18, 2023 10:05 AM
• URL: https://erau.libguides.com/literature-review

Conducting a Literature Review

• Getting Started
• Define your Research Question
• Finding Sources
• Evaluating Sources
• Organizing the Review
• Cite and Manage your Sources

Introduction

The process of evaluating sources can take place when you first encounter a source, when you're reading it over, and as you incorporate it into your project. In general, some level of evaluation should take place at all of these stages, with different goals for each. The last evaluation will be discussed in "Organizing the Review," but we'll go over the first two here.

The overall purpose of evaluating sources is to make sure that your review has the most relevant, accurate, and unbiased literature in the field, so that you can determine what has already been learned about your topic and where further research may be needed.

Additional Resources

• Evaluate Sources by Kansas State University Libraries
• How to Evaluate Any Source by Skyline College Library

Evaluating Sources During the Initial Search Process

When you first encounter a potential source, you'll want to know very quickly whether it is worth reading in detail and considering for your literature review. To avoid wasting time on unhelpful sources as much as possible, it's generally best to run each article, book, or other resource you find through a quick checklist, using information you can find by skimming through the summary and introduction.

The two most common forms of early source evaluation are the "Big 5 Criteria" and the "CRAAP Test." These cover the same most significant variables for evaluation, and which one to use comes down to preference.

Big 5 Criteria:

The most important criteria for evaluating a potential resource are:

• Currency : When the source was published
• Coverage/Relevance : How closely related the source is to your topic and research question
• Authority : Who wrote the source and whether they are likely to be credible on the subject
• Accuracy : Whether the information is accurate or not (this will be more heavily evaluated further on in the research process, but you should skim through quickly for any obviously inaccurate information as a means of disqualifying the source)
• Objectivity/Purpose : Whether or not the source presents a biased point of view or agenda

A good rule of thumb for  Currency  is that medical, scientific, and technology resources should be published within the last 5 years to prevent the information from being out-of-date; for less time-sensitive topics like history or the humanities, resources published within the last 5-10 years are often acceptable.

CRAAP Test:

A helpful mnemonic to remember the evaluation criteria, CRAAP is an acronym for:

Helpful questions for initial evaluation:

• When was this source published?
• Is this source relevant to your topic?
• What are the author or authors' qualifications?
• Is the resource scholarly/peer-reviewed?
• Are sources cited to support the author's claims?
• Does the website or journal the source comes from have a bias to their reporting?
• Do you notice biased or emotional language in the summary or introduction?
• Do you notice spelling or grammatical errors in a quick examination of the source?
• Writing a Research Paper: Evaluate Sources by Kansas State University

Evaluating Sources During the Reading Process

Once a resource has passed the initial evaluation, you are ready to begin reading through it to more carefully determine if it belongs in your project. In addition to the questions posed above, which are always relevant to evaluating sources, you should look at your potential sources of literature with an eye to the following questions:

1. Is there any bias visible in the work?

You already began this process in the previous step and hopefully eliminated the most obviously unreliable sources, but as you read it is always important to keep an eye out for potential blind spots the author might have based on their own perspective. Bias is not inherently disqualifying -- a biased article may still have accurate information -- but it is essential to know if a bias exists and be aware of how it might impact how the information was gathered, evaluated, or delivered.

Peer-reviewed sources tend to be less likely to have this risk, because multiple editors had to go through the resource looking for mistakes or biases. They need to meet a much higher academic threshold.

2. How was the research conducted? Are there any strengths or weaknesses in its methodology?

It is important to understand how the study in your source was administered; a significant part of the literature review will be about potential gaps in the current research, so you need to understand how the existing research was done.

3. How does the author justify their conclusions?

Either through the results of their own research or by citing external evidence, an article, book, or other type of resource should provide proof of its claims. In the initial research process you checked to make sure that there was evidence supporting the author's assertions; now it is time to take a look at that evidence and see if you find it compelling, or if you think it doesn't justify the conclusions drawn by the article.

4. What similarities do these articles share?

Grouping your literature review by categories based on subtopic, findings, or chronology can be an extremely helpful way to organize your work. Take notes while you're reading of common themes and results to make planning the review easier.

5. Where does this research differ from the other sources?

While very close to the previous question, this one emphasizes what unique information, methodology, or insights a particular source brings to the overall understanding of the topic. What  new  knowledge is being brought to the table by this source that would justify it appearing in your literature review?

6. Does this source leave any unanswered questions or opportunities for further research?

Most scholarly journal articles will include a section near the end of the article addressing limits of their study and opportunities for further research. Examine these closely and see where other sources you have fill in the gaps, and where perhaps additional research needs to be done to gain a more complete understanding of your topic.

As you go through this process, you might find yourself eliminating certain sources that no longer seem like they fit with your project's goals, or getting inspired to search for additional sources based on new information you've found. This is a normal part of the research process, and additional searching may be necessary to fill in any gaps left after evaluating the sources you already have.

• << Previous: Finding Sources
• Next: Organizing the Review >>
• Last Updated: Apr 12, 2024 10:37 AM
• URL: https://libraryservices.acphs.edu/lit_review