The literature review process utilizes critical thinking skills (such as comprehension, analysis, and evaluation) to synthesize existing works on a topic or question, resulting in a unique analysis or assessment of the literature on a topic.
The literature review purpose can vary, but it often includes one or more of the following needs:
- to identify trends in the literature,
- to connect ideas in the literature,
- to find gaps in the literature, and
- to find resources that will be the foundation for further research.
Source for image "Bloom’s Taxonomy Inverted Pyramid" in Skills to Make a Librarian, figure 14.1
The steps of a literature review vary according to type, but most reviews include:
- Choosing a topic or question
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Applying a framework or lens to the review (most often in graduate-level and professional work)
- Formulating a criteria (i.e,. deciding what kind of sources will be needed for your synthesis)
- Creating an effective search strategy
- Iterative research of the literature
- An example of an iterative process might be: searching the literature, understanding the results, applying new observations and questions to the search strategy, and repeating the process.
- Selecting final sources.
- Summarizing and analyzing the results.
- Writing the review and properly citing sources.
