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Writing Literature Reviews: Literature Reviews

Resources for getting started on writing a literature review

Selected Resources

For titles in the UC system, use the UC-eLinks button to initiate a Reqest for the title.

Succeeding with Your Literature Review: a Handbook for Students
ebook, UC Merced
Conducting Research Literature Reviews: From the Internet to Paper
print, UC system
Doing a Literature Review in Health and Social Care: A Practical Guide
ebook, UC Merced
Systematic Approaches to a Successful Literature Review
print, UC system
Health Sciences Literature Review Made Easy: The Matrix Method
print, UC system
Ten Simple Rules for Writing a Literature Review
from PLOS Computational Biology (2013), Marco Pautassos

About the Literature Review

The Literature Review
Concise tips from Professor Nancy Rivenburgh at the University of Washington, The Graduate School
The Literature Review: A Few Tips on Conducting It
by Dena Taylor at the University of Toronto, Health Sciences Writing Centre
Sage Research Methods: Reviewing the Literature
This guide reviews the steps of the literature review process, and provides an overview of where to search for appropriate literature.

Literature Reviews: An Overview for Graduate Students

We have highlighted some sections which may be of particular interest.

Research is about telling a story -- a professor's perspective (2:12 - 3:08)
Different types of literature review -- e.g. in a thesis or dissertation (3:48 - 4:13)
So what's involved in reviewing the literature? (7:00 - 8:46)

* produced by NC State University Libraries (~10 minutes)

Strategy

Locating an in-depth review related to your topic of interest, can be a good first step to finding relevant information. Look for literature reviews limiters in various databases. Note that in some search tools reviews refer to book reviews and not literature reviews. e.g. in JSTOR

ScienceDirect/SciVerse
Advanced Search > Journals tab > Review article (found under Limit by document type)

Web of Science
Provides access to multiple science and social science databases: Arts & Humanities Citation Index (1975 - present), Social Sciences Citation Index (1956 - present), Science Citation Index (1900 - present), Conference Proceedings Citation Index-Science (1990 - present), and Conference Proceedings Citation Index-Social Science & Humanities (1990 - present). Also includes Emerging Sources Citation Index (ESCI).
PsycINFO (ProQuest)
1806 - present. The PsycINFO database contains citations to articles in over 1,300 professional journals, conference proceedings, books, , and dissertations in psychology and related disciplines. Most citations include abstracts.

Synthesis Templates

Synthesis grids are organizational tools used to record the main concepts of your sources and can help you make connections about how your sources relate to one another.

Source Template
Basic Literature Review Source Template from Walden University Writing Center to help record the main findings and concepts from different articles.

Sample Literature Review Grids
This spreadsheet contains multiple tabs with different grid templates. Download or create your own copy to begin recording notes.