Literature review assignment on the importance of good literature reviews and criteria for judging the review
Question
Task: Explain in your literature review assignmentthe role and significance of a good literature review in all research and explain how you would judge a review to be comprehensive.
Answer
Introduction
Every literature review assignmentresearch paper is divided into several chapters or sections, out of which literature review is one of the most essential parts. A literature review is the comprehensive summary of earlier researches on a specific topic (EfronandRavid, 2018). It reviews a variety of scholarly articles, books, documents and other sources that are relevant to the selected topic. This helps in creating a landscape or overview for the readers, thereby providing a complete understanding about the developments in the topic.Thus, it should enumerate, comprehend, analyse, summarize, evaluate objectively and clarify such previous researches. The purpose of the literature review assignmenthere is to describe the function and implication of a high-quality literature review in all study and further clarify how to ensure comprehensiveness of such review. The literature review assignmenthas been structured by including different sections, namely, role of literature review, importance of literature review, criteria for judging a good literature review and identified gaps for future exploration.
Role of Literature Review assignment
Literature review assignmentplay significant role in scholarship as it helps in rigorous knowledge syntheses. These reviews have been essential for determining previous writings on a selected idea, field of study or topic and identifying the degree to which interpretable trends or patterns are obtained from a specific research area. Furthermore, it also plays a role in aggregating any empirical findings associated with a narrowed-down research question for providing support to practices based on evidence, generating new theories or frameworks and recognizing topics or questions that require further investigation (LauandKuziemsky, 2016). A literature review assignment is conducted for demonstrating authors’ knowledge related to a specific field of study, theories, topic and others. It further helps the students to know about influential researchers and research groups in the fields. Literature review further helps in delineating research problem, identifying new prospects of inquiry, preventing unproductive approaches, acquiring procedural insights, suggesting recommendations and seeking support for any grounded theory. Besides, it is required for the researcher of the literature review assignmentto distinguish previous researchers from the current one, recognizing important variables associated with the topic, acquiring a new perspective and recognizing relationships existing between notions and practices (Terrell, 2022). Conducting a literature review is further essential for formulating the research backgroundand problem statement, justifyingthe research significance, comprehending the structure of the subject, improving the subject vocabulary, identifying research techniques and methodologies and understanding the researchers from a historical context.The literature review assignment plays a significant role in providing a framework for creating a link between previous and new findings in the discussion chapter of a dissertation.
Furthermore, literature review assignment has a definite purpose in the dissertation. It is designed and formulated for displaying the researcher’s knowledge related to a particular topic or subject. This consists of theories, vocabulary, key terms, seminal researchers, definitions and research within the selected field (Osanlooand Grant, 2016).The literature review assignment plays an important role for discovering important ideas and variables associated with the topic, gaining new and detailed perspectives, identifying relationships, establishing topic context, rationalizing research problem and its significance and relating ideas and theories. Literature review has the capacity of recognizing gaps or paucity of information in the existing articles written on specific or selected areas (Okoli, 2015). These identified gaps are specific areas where the researcher can further contribute towards the literature of the particular field. In this regard, often theoretical framework is used for logical development and understanding of different parts of the literature review. This literature review assignment is generally divided into three sub chapters; namely, reviewing previous studies associated with the topic, conducting theoretical review and developing theoretical framework (Rudestam and Newton, 2014). In the first chapter, previous study reviews are included along side conducting positive and negative evaluation, comparison between current and previous research and identifying research gaps. The theoretical review involves forming the foundation knowledge and references from the previous research. These are underlying theories helping the researcher in writing discussion part of the dissertation (Rudestam and Newton, 2014). Lastly, theoretical framework is used for writing the literature review assignment in a systematic manner.
Literature review demonstrates the researcher’s skills related to library searching. It enables the researcher in showing command over the particular subject area alongside understanding the research problem (EfronandRavid, 2018). This further helps in justifying the research topic, design and methodology in the dissertation. It is an essential part present in a research process that is required for ensuring the success of the study. One of the major roles played by literature review assignment is ensuring the researchability of the topic before the commencement of actual research. Literature review helps in progressive narrowing of the research topic, thereby making the research a practical consideration (EfronandRavid, 2018).Thus, it helps in establishing the foundation of various academic inquiries as well. In this regard, literature review helps in knowledge advancement developed on existing work of the scholars. It becomes easier to understand both breadth and depth of previous studies and work and identifying gaps by reviewing relevant literature (Xiaoand Watson, 2019).In addition, literature review assignment further enables the researcher in testing a specific hypothesis or developing new theories, evaluating the quality and validity of existing work and reveal any inconsistencies, weaknesses or contradictions by summarizing, analysing and synthesizing literature.
Significance of High-Quality Literature Review
Literature review assignment is of utmost importance because it helps in describing the relation of proposed research to prior studies in statistics. It also displays both relevance and originality of the research problem being addressed along with justifying the proposed methodology (Machiand McEvoy, 2021). It further displays the preparedness of the researcher in completing the research. Furthermore, it helps in displaying the fact that the researcher is aware about the wide range of research previously undertaken by other scholars associated with the research topic. It is required for gaining a profound understanding of the available research related to the dissertation topic, which further helps in building the foundation of researcher’s knowledge. It also supports the originality and relevance of the research problem being addressed in the dissertation (Machiand McEvoy, 2021). Thus, literature review assignment shows that the current research is an original and relevant contribution to the existing studies.
The fundamental goal of literature reviews is to recapitulate and combine the existing knowledge gained about a research topic. There exist three different situations where it is essential to write a literature review (Kraus, BreierandDasí-Rodríguez, 2020). These include the first step of a large research paper or dissertation, standalone review article about a selected topic and introduction to an empirical paper or hypothesis formulation. Traditional literature review assignmentrarelyfocus on evaluating the value of articles or following any specific rules. This is because they are mainly useful for writing introductions of experimental papers anddiscussionpapers or formal presentationsfor supporting the formulated hypothesis. On the other hand, systematic literature reviews rank literature based on its quality by following a transparent methodology and pre-defined process of analysis(Kraus, BreierandDasí-Rodríguez, 2020).It helps in reaching a conclusion and exhibiting relevant facts about a definite research topic. Thus, both of these literature reviews emphasize on carrying out different objectives.
Furthermore, literature review assignment is important as it provides readers with an overview of the thorough scientific references considered by the writer. It includes a framework of various empirical developments carried out in the field of the current research topic (Rukmini, 2019). Reviewing existing literatures enables the dissertation writer to learn important concepts, techniques and research methods being used in the field of study. However, it does not merely include summarizing the previous findings but also evaluating the theories being criticized, reviewed and judging their quality (Rukmini, 2019). This helps in determining the writer’s ability of undertaking a critical evaluation of the research area for seeking out something new that has not been studied before. The main reasons for conducting a literature review assignment include identifying already completed work, reducing duplication of previous work, avoiding flaws present in previous studies, formulating a research design and locating gaps in existing research for exploring a mew topic (Rukmini, 2019). Thus, this makes it as important part of research paper or dissertation. Integrative review is another unique research type used for generatingawareness about the research topic being studied. It emphasizes on studying, criticizing and creatingillustrative literature based on a particular topic in ancombined way (Torraco, 2016). This further helps in generating new frameworks and viewpoints about the research topic. Besides, integrative literature reviews are useful for reviewing dynamic topics experiencing increased growth and not updated for a longer time. These also help in reviewing new and emerging topics creating a growing literature body and including discrepancies or contradictions not addressed in the literature (Torraco, 2016). Thus, integrative reviews help in removing inconsistencies through providing review and critique to arrive at fresh new perspectives on the topic.
Literature review assignment also helps researchers in joining the conversation by displaying context, informing methodology, ensuring professional standards being met, reducing duplicative research and recognizing innovation. The review enables the researcher in articulating clear goals, presenting evidence of research preparation, choosingsuitable methods, showing relevant results and engaging in reflective critique (Maggio, SewellandArtino Jr, 2016). It is essential to conduct high-quality literature reviews for avoiding several problems associated with repetitiveness in studies, grounded theory, weak methodologies and failure of expanding knowledge. This literature review assignment can be iterative, time consuming and continue throughout the entire research process. Thus, it forms the basis of identifying relevant conceptual frameworks for the current research. It has been observed that literature reviews are important for various reasons. It helps in summarizing the relevant, essential and valid information acquired from different studies or articles in a document that further allows to formulate rationale of the current research (Danson and Arshad, 2014). It further provides a starting point to the researcher in identifying and understanding existing articles about the particular topic. Thus, conducting literature review assignment is also helpful for determining potential gaps, discrepancies and inconsistencies in the previous studies for minimizing them in the current research, thereby enhancing clarity in thinking.
Criteria for Judging Good literature review assignment
A good literature review assignment is undertaken as a continuous process starting with the formulation of a particular research idea. It helps in assisting in the data analysis, presentation and discussion of the results. Furthermore, a high-quality literature review is also precise, concise and comprehensive that helps in ensuring that important variables are not omitted from the research (Foss, 2015). Cooper’s taxonomy of literature reviews can also be used for judging a review
based on different characteristics. These include
• focus,
• goal,
• perspective,
• coverage,
• organization and
• audience.
The first dimension, focus, can be referred to as the subject matter being included in the research in the variety of theories, policies, practices, experientialfindings and research methods (Liand Wang, 2018).The literature review assignment helps in analysing the central issue of interest being addressed through the use of research outcomes, theories, methods and applications.
Goals mainly include summarization of existing knowledge, identifying issues associated with the research field and examining the soundness of the different aspects of the primary researchers being included in the literature review section. It helps in determining whether the literature review assignment is integrative, critical or identifying only central issues in the field. This dimension can help in understanding whether the dissertation or research review aims to accomplish clear goals, thereby presenting the readers with the overall picture (Thomé, ScavardaandScavarda, 2016).
Perspective is the third dimension that helps in analysing the standpoint of the literature review assignmentreviewer, which can be either a neutral position or predisposition of a certain argument. This is essential for evaluating the point of view of the researcher and classifying it as neutral presentation or espousal of position. It further helps in identifying and reducing biases of the researcher.
Coverage determines whether a literature review has been conducted based on all existing studies or some specific set of researches (Liand Wang, 2018). Here, often different types of coverage are found, which are exhaustive, representative, exhaustive with selective citation and central or pivotal. This dimension is essential in analysing how wide the net has been cast for conducting the literature review. It helps in reassuring the validity and exhaustiveness of the articles used in the literature review assignment.
Organization is another dimension of the taxonomy that determines the structure of the review depending on the chronologicalimprovement of the research. It also reviews the themes emerging from the literature along with the methods used in the sub categories of studies (Thomé, ScavardaandScavarda, 2016). Thus, it evaluates the literature review assignmentbased on three axes, namely, historical, conceptual and methodological.
Lastly, the literature review assignmentcan be evaluated based on the audience that it intends to reach. These mainly include researchers, scholars, general public, practitioners and others. Besides, the literature review can also be analysed based on the specific aims and reach, assistance in directing the entire research and its structure for presenting the report results. Thus, based on these different dimensions of Cooper’s taxonomy, it can be easier to evaluate the literature review of a literature review assignment paper or dissertation.
Gaps for Future Exploration
The literature review assignmenthas reviewed various scholarly articles to analyse the role and importance of literature review in a dissertation. It has clearly pointed out how literature review helps in developing a solid foundation of knowledge for completing the entire research. However, there still exists some inconsistencies and gaps associated with the criteria of judging a good literature review. In this regard, Foss (2015) has focused on three dimensions like precise, concise and comprehensiveness in analysing the literature review of a dissertation. On the other hand, some literature review assignmentresearchers have displayed the use of Cooper’s taxonomy variables likeperspective,focus, audience, coverage, organization and goalfor evaluating literature review. However, these dimensions are more effective in classifying literature reviews under different groups. This taxonomy is more useful for understanding differences between research approaches. It shows that it is not very effective in analysing the quality of a good literature review assignment as the dimensions provided cannot be used as specific criteria for judgment. This results in gap in the existing studies related to the criteria for a good review, which can be explored further in the future studies.
Conclusion
The literature review assignmentaimed at exploring the usefulness of a first-class literature review in various research studies and further clarified what criteria can be used for judging a good review. In this regard, a brief background and definition of literature review was provided in the introduction section of the essay. Furthermore, the role of literature review was explored by reviewing different articles. It displayed how conducting literature review is essential for developing a solid basis for completing the rest of the research paper. Besides, the significance of literature review was also discussed by analysing different scholarly articles. Here, Cooper’s taxonomy variables were also identified as useful for evaluating and judging a good literature review. However, it was observed in this literature review assignmentthat this taxonomy was more appropriate in differentiating between different types of literature review. Thus, this gap was identified to be handled in the future researches.
Reference List
Danson, M. and Arshad, N., 2014. The literature review. Research methods for business and management: A guide to writing your dissertation, pp.37-57.
Efron, S.E. and Ravid, R., 2018. Writing the literature review: A practical guide. Guilford Publications.
Foss, S.K., 2015. Destination dissertation: A traveler's guide to a done dissertation. Rowman & Littlefield.
Kraus, S., Breier, M. and Dasí-Rodríguez, S., 2020. The art of crafting a systematic literature review in entrepreneurship research. International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal, 16(3), pp.1023-1042.
Lau, F. and Kuziemsky, C., 2016. Handbook of eHealth evaluation: an evidence-based approach.
Li, S. and Wang, H., 2018. Traditional literature review and research synthesis. The Palgrave handbook of applied linguistics research methodology, pp.123-144.
Machi, L.A. and McEvoy, B.T., 2021. The literature review: Six steps to success. Corwin Press.
Maggio, L.A., Sewell, J.L. and Artino Jr, A.R., 2016. The literature review: A foundation for high-quality medical education research. Journal of graduate medical education, 8(3), pp.297-303.
Okoli, C., 2015. A guide to conducting a standalone systematic literature review. Communications of the Association for Information Systems, 37(1), p.43.
Osanloo, A. and Grant, C., 2016. Understanding, selecting, and integrating a theoretical framework in dissertation research: Creating the blueprint for your “house”. Administrative issues journal: connecting education, practice, and research, 4(2), p.7.
Rudestam, K.E. and Newton, R.R., 2014. Surviving your dissertation: A comprehensive guide to content and process. Sage publications.
Rukmini, D., 2019. The literature review in the dissertation: The language education of Universitas Negeri Semarang. Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research (ASSEHR), 188, pp. 366-370.
Terrell, S.R., 2022. Writing a proposal for your dissertation: Guidelines and examples. Guilford Publications.
Thomé, A.M.T., Scavarda, L.F. and Scavarda, A.J., 2016. Conducting systematic literature review in operations management. Production Planning & Control, 27(5), pp.408-420.
Torraco, R.J., 2016. Writing integrative literature reviews: Using the past and present to explore the future. Human resource development review, 15(4), pp.404-428.
Xiao, Y. and Watson, M., 2019. Guidance on conducting a systematic literature review. Journal of planning education and research, 39(1), pp.93-112.
