PREPARING A WRITTEN LITERATURE REVIEW

1. PREPARING A WRITTENLITERATURE REVIEW Dr. Aidah Abu Elsoud Alkaissi An-Najah National University Nursing College

2. PREPARING A WRITTENLITERATURE REVIEW • A number of steps are involved in preparing a written review, as summarized in Figure 5-1. As the figure shows, after identifying potential sources, you need to locate the references and screen them for theirrelevancy.

3. Screening References • References that have been identified through the literature search need to be screened. • One screen is totally practical—is the reference readily accessible? • For example, although abstracts of dissertationsmaybe easy to retrieve, full dissertations are not; some references may be written in a language you do not read. • A second screen is the relevance of the reference, which you can usually (but not always) surmise by reading the abstract. • When abstracts are not available, you will need to take aguess about relevance based on the title. • For critical integrated reviews (see Chapter 27), a third criterion is the study’s methodologicquality—that is, the quality of evidence the study yields.

4. Abstracting and Recording Notes • Once a document has been determined to be relevant, you should read the entire report carefully and critically, identifying material that is sufficiently important to warrant note taking and observing flaws in the study or gaps in the report. • As noted earlier, it is useful to work with photocopied articles so that you can highlight or underline critical information. • Even with a copied article, we recommend taking notes or writing a summary of the report’s strengths and limitations. • A formal protocol is sometimes helpful for recording information in a systematic fashion. An example of such a protocol is presented in Figure 5-2.

5. Organizing the Review • Organization of information is a critical task in preparing a written review. • When the literature on a topic is extensive, we recommend preparing a summary table. • The table could include columns with headings such as Author, Type of Study (QualitativeversusQuantitative), Sample, Design, Data Collection Approach, and Key Findings. • Such a table provides a quick overview that allows you to make sense of a mass of information.

6. Example of a summary table: • Abercrombie (2001) reviewed research related to strategies that have been found to improve follow-up after an abnormal Papanicolaou (Pap) smear test. • Her review included a table that summarized nine studies. • The headings in her columns were: Author and date; sample size; objectives; design/intervention; and results.

7. Most writers find it helpful to work from an outline when preparing a written review. • If the review is lengthy and complex, it is useful to write out the outline; a mental outline may be sufficient for shorter reviews. • The important point is to work out a structure before starting to write so that the presentation has a meaningful and understandable flow.

8. Lack of organization is a common weakness in students’ first attempts at writing a research literature review. • Although the specifics of the organization differ from topic to topic, the overall goal is to structure the review in such a way that the presentation is logical, demonstrates meaningful integration, and leads to a conclusion about what is known and not known about the topic.

9. TIP: An important principle in organizing a review is to figure out a way to cluster and compare studies. • For example, you could contrast studies that have similar findings with studies that have conflicting or inconclusive findings, making sure to analyze why the discrepancies may have occurred. • Or you might want to cluster studies that have operationalized key variables in similar ways. • Other reviews might have as an organizing theme the nature of the setting or the sample if research findings vary according to key characteristics (e.g., comparing research with female subjects and research with male subjects, if the results differ.) Doing a research review is a little bit like doing a qualitative study—you must searchfor importantthemes.

10. Once the main topics and their order of presentation have been determined, a review of the notes is in order. • This not only will help you recall materials read earlier but also will lay the groundwork for decisions about where (if at all) a particular reference fits in terms of your outline. • If certain references do not seem to fit anywhere, the outline may need to be revised or the reference discarded.

11. Writing a Literature Review • At this point, you will have completed the most difficult tasks of the literature review process, but that process is not complete until you have drafted and edited a written product.

12. Content of the WrittenLiterature Review • A written research review should provide readers with an objective, well-organized summary of the current state of knowledge on a topic. • A literature review should be neither a series of quotes nor a series of abstracts. • The central tasks are to summarize and critically evaluate the evidence so as to reveal the current state of knowledge on a topic—not simply to describe what researchers have done. • The review should point out both consistencies and contradictions in the literature, and offer possible explanationsfor inconsistencies (e.g., different conceptualizations or data collection methods).

13. Although important studies should be described in some detail, it is not necessary to provide extensive coverage for every reference (especially if there are page constraints). • Reports of lesser significance that result in comparable findings can be summarizedtogether.

14. Example of grouped studies: • McCullagh, Lusk, and Ronis (2002, p. 33) summarized several studies as follows: “Although noise-induced hearing loss is preventable through appropriate use of hearing protection devices, studies among farmers consistently show a low level of use • (Broste et al., 1989; Engstrand, 1995; Hallet, 1987; • Karlovich et al.,1988; Langsford et al., 1995)

15. The literature should be summarized in your own words. • The review should demonstrate that consideration has been given to the cumulative significance of the body of research. • Stringing together quotes from various documents fails to show that previous research has been assimilated and understood. • The review should be objective, to the extent possible. • Studies that conflict with personal values or hunches should not be omitted. • The review also should not deliberately ignore a study because its findings contradict other studies. • Inconsistent results should be analyzed and the supporting evidence evaluatedobjectively.

16. The literature review should conclude with a summary of the state of the art of knowledge on the topic. • The summary should recap study findings and indicate how credible they are; it should also make note of gaps or areas of research inactivity. • The summary thus requires critical judgment about the extensiveness and dependability of the evidence on a topic. • If the literature review is conducted as part of a new study, this critical summary should demonstrate the need for the research and should clarify the context within which any hypotheses weredeveloped.

17. TIP: The literature review section of a research report (or research proposal) usually includes information not only about what is known about the problem and relevant interventions (if any), but about how prevalent the problem is. • In research reports and proposals, the authors are trying to “build a case” for their new study.

18. Style of a Research Review • Students preparing their first written research review often have trouble adjusting to the standard style of such reviews. • For example, some students accept research results without criticism or reservation, reflecting a common misunderstanding about the conclusiveness of empirical research. • You should keep in mind that no hypothesis or theory can be proved or disproved by empirical testing, and no research question can be definitely answered in a single study. • Every study has some limitations, the severity of which is affected by the researcher’s methodologic decisions. • The fact that theories and hypotheses cannot be ultimately proved or disproved does not, of course, mean that we must disregard evidence or challenge every idea

19. we encounter—especially if results have been replicated. • The problem is partly a semantic one: • hypotheses are not proved, they are supported by research findings; theories are not verified, but they may be tentatively accepted if there a substantial body of evidence demonstrates their legitimacy.

20. TIP: • When describing study findings, you should generally use phrases indicating tentativeness of the results, such as the following: • Severalstudies havefound • Findingsthus far suggest • Results from a landmark study indicated • The data supported the hypothesis . . . • There appears to be strong evidence that

21. A related stylistic problem is an inclination of novice reviewers to interject opinions (their own or someone else’s) into the review. • The review should include opinions sparingly and should be explicit about their source. Reviewers’ own opinions do not belong in a review, with the exception of assessments of studyquality.

22. SUMMARY POINTS • A research literature review is a written summary of the state of existing knowledge on a research problem. • The task of reviewing research literature involves the identification, selection, critical analysis, and written description of existing information on a topic. • Researchers review the research literature to develop research ideas, to determine knowledge on a topic of interest, to provide a context for a study, and to justify the need for a study; consumers reviewand synthesizeevidence-basedinformation to gain knowledge and improve nursingpractice.

23. The most important type of information for a research review are findings from empirical studies. • Various nonresearch references—includingopinion articles, case reports, anecdotes, and clinical descriptions—may serve to broaden understanding of a research problem or demonstrate a need for research, but in general they have limited utility in written research reviews. • A primary source with respect to the research literature is the original description of a study prepared by the researcher who conducted it; a secondary source is a description of the study by a person unconnected with it. • Primary sources should be consulted whenever possible • in performing a literature review.

24. An importantbibliographicdevelopment for locatingreferences for a research review is the widespread availability of various electronic databases, many of which can be accessed through an online search or by way of CDROM. • For nurses, the CINAHL and MEDLINE ® databases are especiallyuseful. • In searching a bibliographic database, users usually perform a subject search for a topic of interest, but other types of searches (e.g., textwordsearch, author search) are available.

25. Although electronic information retrieval is widespread, print resources such as print indexes and abstract journals are also available. • References that have been identified must be screened for relevance and then read critically. • For research reviews, most references are likely to be found in professional journals. • Research journal articles provide briefdescriptionsof research studies and are designed to communicate the contribution the study has madeto knowledge.

26. Journal articles often consist of an abstract (a brief synopsis of the study) and four major sections: • an introduction (explanation of the study problem and its context); method section (the strategies used to address the research problem); results section (the actual study findings); and discussion (the interpretation of the findings). • Research reports are often difficult to read because they are dense, concise, and contain a lot of jargon. • Qualitative research reports are written in a more inviting and conversational style than quantitative ones, which are more impersonal and include information on statistical tests.

27. Statistical tests are procedures for testing research hypotheses and evaluating the believabilit of the findings. • Findings that are statistically significant are ones that have a high probability of being reliable. • In preparing a written review, it is important to organize materials in a logical, coherent fashion. • The preparation of an outline is recommended, and the development of summary chartsoftenhelps in integrating diverse studies.

28. The written review should not be a succession of quotes or abstracts. • The reviewers’ role is to point out what has been studied, how adequate and dependable the studies are, what gaps exist in the body of research, and (in the context of a new study), what contribution the study would make.