WRITING THE REVIEW OF

RELATED LITERATURE (RRL)

for RESEARCH
Special Science High School Grade 10
Quarter 2 / Week 3

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 FOREWORD

Research IV for Grade 10 aims to enhance the research project

conducted in Grade 9. Competencies were designed to equip students with
enhanced knowledge of conducting experimental research. Research IV may
serve as an avenue for students to demonstrate higher level of competence
in research by enhancing their previous research project and conducting a
continuing research or a new research project.

To acquire mastery and competence in conducting sound researches,

establishing a stronger linkage, collaboration and maximizing the available
resources of research institutions and the community shall be practiced.
Likewise, constant coaching and consultation with experts will also be done for
robust and well-guided execution of the enhanced research project/plan.

This paper discusses the importance of good research and the common
causes of research bias. It also provides guidelines for evaluating research and
data quality and describes examples of bad research.

This learning kit is composed of three parts:

1. What Happened

This section provides activities that will prepare learners to the

discussion of the topic provided in this material.

2. What To Learn

This is the discussion section of the SLK. Exercises after the

discussion are also provided to further enrich student’s learning of the
topic.

3. What You Have Learned

This portion will gauge student’s learning and will determine how
much the learner has learned.

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COMPETENCIES:

• Utilizes the standards (criteria or checklist) in evaluating research paper

(peer/group/expert evaluation).

• Revises/ enhances the research project by incorporating the

suggestions given by the peer/group/experts.

OBJECTIVES:

At the end of the lesson, you should be able to:

K: Identify the contents of the literature review of a research

paper.
S: Create a sample literature review using the research (SIP)
done in grade 9; and
A: Express appreciation on the effectiveness of a well-written
literature review by accomplishing the tasks and activities
provided.

Now, let’s begin this learning journey…

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What Happened
PRETEST:
Directions: Below are sources of information that can be used for your review
of related literature. Pick out the ones that are credible and can be used as
reference for review. Write them on your activity notebook.

Previous researches Maps Digests

Comic books Encyclopedias Newspapers

Conference papers Editorial articles

Blogposts Statistics Journal articles

Magazines Hearsays Dissertations

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What I Need To Know
DISCUSSION:

What is a Literature Review?

A literature review is a text of a scholarly paper, which includes the current

knowledge including substantive findings, as well as theoretical and
methodological contributions to a particular topic. Literature reviews are
secondary sources and do not report new or original experimental work. Most
often associated with academic-oriented literature, such reviews are found in
academic journals and are not to be confused with book reviews that may
also appear in the same publication. Literature reviews are a basis for research
in nearly every academic field.

A literature review is a compilation, classification, and evaluation of what

other researchers have written on a particular topic. A literature review
normally forms part of a research thesis, but it can also stand alone as a self-
contained review of writings on a subject. In either case, its purpose is to:
• Convey to the reader previous knowledge and facts established on a
topic and their strength and weakness.
• Allow the reader to be updated with the state of research in a field and
any contradictions that may exist with challenges and findings of other
research studies.
• Help develop research investigative tools and to improve research
methodologies.
• Provide the knowledge about the problems faced by the previous
researchers while studying the same topic.
• Place each in the context of its contribution to the understanding of
subject under review.
• Describe the relationship of each study to other research studies under
consideration.
• Identify new ways to interpret and shed light on any gaps in previous
research.
• Resolve conflicts among seemingly contradictory previous studies.
• Identify areas of prior scholarship to prevent duplication of effort.
• Point a way forward for further research.
• See what has and has not been investigated.
• Develop general explanation for observed variations in a behavior or
phenomenon.
• Identify potential relationship between concepts and to identify
researchable hypothesis.
• Learn how others have defined and measured key concepts.
• Identify data sources that other researchers have used.

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 • Develop alternative research projects.
• Discover how a research project is related to the work of others.
• Place one’s original work (in case of thesis or dissertation) context of the
existing literature.

You can think of the above points as goals to be achieved in the process
of writing a literature review. Before you can achieve any of these goals,
however, you need to narrow down the possible subject areas into a relatively
well-defined problem/issue, research question, or research objective.

General Guidelines in Writing a Literature Review

⚫ You will need to pick out the research most relevant to the topic you are
studying.
⚫ Don’t attempt to cover everything written on your topic.
⚫ You will use the studies in your literature review as “evidence” that your
research question is an important one.

Steps in Writing your Literature Review

⚫ Step 1: Review APA guidelines.

⚫ Step 2: Decide on a topic.
⚫ Step 3: Identify the literature that you will review.
⚫ Step 4: Analyze the literature.
⚫ Step 5: Summarize the literature in table or concept map format.
⚫ Step 6: Write the review.

In organizing your Literature Review, the following must be considered:

▪ CHRONOLOGICAL: This is a common approach, especially for topics that

have been talked about for a long time and have changed over their
history.
▪ COMPARISON TO PRESENT HYPOTHESIS: If your literature review is part of
an empirical article or meta-analysis, where you intend to present a
hypothesis and come to a conclusion, you can organize the literature
review to show the articles that share or support your hypothesis and
those that disagree with it.
▪ PROMINENT AUTHORS: If a certain researcher started a field, and there
are several famous people who developed it more, a good approach
can be grouping the famous author/researchers and what each is
known to have said about the topic.
▪ PROCESS FLOW: If your literature review centers around part of a process,
you may want to describe the stages in that process and group your
citations by different stages or steps in that process.

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What is the Structure of a Literature Review?

In writing a literature review you need to demonstrate your intellectual

ability to recognize relevant information and to synthesize and evaluate it
according to the tentative guiding research question/thesis statement you
have developed. Your reader wants to know: a) what literature exists, but also
b) your informed evaluation of the literature. While reviewing the literature, you
need to be answering questions such as:

1. What are the main ideas and contributions that form the core of the
literature?
2. Which papers are important and which ones are not?
3. Have there been controversies and how have they been resolved?
4. What are the common assumptions made in the papers you are
reviewing?
5. What are the current deficiencies/mistakes and unresolved issues as you
see them?
6. Are there important connections to other topics?
7. Has the emphasis been more empirical or theoretical? Why?

In your literature review you should:

▪ Group research studies and other relevant literature according to a
common theme.
▪ Summarize each item of the literature appropriately according to its
significance.
▪ Compare and evaluate each item of the literature.
▪ Provide topic sentences at the beginning of paragraphs and summary
sentences at the end of sections to help the reader understand what
the main issues are.

Some students find that the most difficult part at this stage is to group the
papers they have chosen for review so that their analysis weaves a logical story
of how the literature fits together and has progressed over time. For this reason,
I have provided below some general guidelines on how you might classify
different writings on your topic. You may use the following sub-headings to
classify what you have read, or you may narrow the focus of your review to
deal with some of these categories only. Or there may be still other categories
that are more appropriate for your research.

For example:
• Research outcomes
• Research methods
• Theories
• Applications

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 • Integration of the works of others
• Criticism of previous work
• Building of bridges between related topics
• Identification of central issue(s).

What Makes a Good Literature Review?

A good literature review:
▪ clearly delimits the subject matter to be reviewed;
▪ covers all important relevant literature;
▪ is up to date;
▪ provides an insightful analysis of the ideas and conclusions in the
literature;
▪ points out similarities and differences and strengths and weaknesses in
the literature;
▪ identifies gaps in the literature for future research; and
▪ identifies the context for which the literature is important.

Sources of Literature Review

Literature can be reviewed from two sources:

1. Primary sources

Literature review mostly relies on primary sources, that is, research reports,
which are description of studies written by researchers who conducted them.
A primary source is written by a person who developed the theory or
conducted the research or is the description of an investigation written by the
person who conducted it. Most primary sources are found in published
literature.

For example, a nursing research article.

Example of a primary source: An original qualitative on patient experiences
in the ICU: Hupcey, J. E. (2000). Feeling safe the psychosocial needs of ICU
patients. Journal of Nursing Scholarship, 32:361-367.

2. Secondary sources

Secondary source research documents are description of studies prepared

by someone other than the original researcher. They are written by people
other than the individuals who developed the theory or conducted the
research. The secondary sources may be used when primary sources are not
available or if researchers want external opinions on an issue or problem.

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 Example of a Secondary Source: A literature review on patient experiences
in the ICU: Stein-Parbury, J. & Mckinley, S. (2000) patient experiences of
being in an intensive care unit: a select literature review. American Journal
of critical care, 9:20-27.

The main sources from where literature can be found are:

www.drjayeshpatidar.blogspot.com

Stages of Literature Review

Stage I – Annotated Bibliography

⚫ At this stage, researchers read articles, books, and other types of
literature related to the topic of research and write a brief critical
synopsis of each review.
⚫ After going through the reading list, researchers will have an annotation
of each source of related literature.
⚫ Later, annotations are likely to include more references of other work
since previous readings will be available to compare, but at this point
the important goal is to get accurate summary of the study.

Stage II – Thematic Organization

⚫ At this stage, researchers try to find common themes of research topic
and organize the literature under these themes, subthemes, or
categories.
⚫ Here, researchers try to organize literature under themes, which relate to
each other and are arranged in a chronological manner.

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 ⚫ Researchers try to establish coherence between themes and literature
discussed under these themes.

Stage III – More Reading

⚫ Based on the knowledge gained through primary reading, researchers
have a better understanding about the research topic and the literature
related to it.
⚫ At this stage, researchers try to discover specific literature materials
relevant to the field of study or research methodologies which are more
relevant for their research.
⚫ They look for more literature by those authors, on those methodologies,
etc.
⚫ Also, the researchers may be able to set aside some less relevant areas
or articles which they pursued initially.
⚫ They integrate the new readings into their literature review and draft,
organize themes, and read more existing researches that are related to
the topic.

Stage IV – Sections
⚫ At this stage, researchers start writing the literature under each thematic
section by using previously collected draft of annotations.
⚫ Here, they organize the related articles under each theme by ensuring
that every article is related to each other.
⚫ Furthermore, related articles may be grouped together by ensuring the
coherence between different segments of the literature abstracts.
⚫ For each thematic sections, draft annotations are used (it is a good idea
to reread the articles and revise annotations, especially the ones read
initially) to write a section which discusses the articles relevant to the
studies.
⚫ While writing reviews, the researchers focus on the theme of that section,
showing how the articles relate to each other and to the theme, rather
than focusing on writing each individual article.
⚫ The articles are used as evidence to support the critique of the theme
rather than using the theme as an angle to discuss each article
individually

Stage V – Integrate Sections

⚫ In this section, researchers have a list of the thematic sections and they
tie them together with an introduction, conclusion, and some additions
and revisions in the sections to show how they relate to each other and
to the overall theme.

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Preparing a Written Literature

1. Introduction:
• A concise definition of a topic under consideration (this may be a
descriptive or argumentative thesis, or proposal), as well as the
scope of the related literature being investigated. (e.g., if the
topic under consideration is “women’s wartime diaries,” the scope
of the review may be limited to published or unpublished works,
works in English, works from a particular location, time period, or
conflict, etc.)
• The introduction should also note intentional exclusions. (e.g., “This
review will not explore the diaries of adolescent girls.”)
• Another purpose of the introduction is to state the general findings
of the review (what do most of the sources conclude?), and
comment on the availability of sources in the subject area.

While writing the introduction, the following steps should be taken care of:
▪ Define or identify the general topic, issue, or area of concern, thus,
providing appropriate context for reviewing the literature.
▪ Point out overall trends in what has been published about the topic or
conflicts in theory, methodology, evidence, and conclusion or gaps in
research and scholarship or a single problem or new perspective of
immediate interest.
▪ Establish the writer’s point of view for reviewing the literature and explain
the criteria to be used in analyzing and comparing literature and
organization or review (sequence), when necessary.

2. Main Body:
• There are many ways to organize the evaluation of the sources.
Chronological and thematic approaches are useful examples.
• Each work should be critically summarized and evaluated for its
premise, methodology, and conclusion. It is as important to
address inconsistencies, omissions, and errors, as it is to identify
accuracy, depth, and relevance.
• Use logical connections and transitions to connect sources.

The following measures need to be undertaken while writing the body of

the literature.
⚫ Group research studies and other types of literature (reviews, theoretical
articles, case studies) according to common denominators such as
qualitative versus quantitative approaches, conclusions of authors,
specific purposes or objectives, chronology, and so on.

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 ⚫ Summarize individual studies or articles with as much as or as little detail
as each merit according to its comparative importance in the literature,
remembering that space denotes significance.
⚫ Assist the reader with strong “umbrella” sentences at the beginning of
paragraphs, signpost throughout, and brief “so what” summary
sentences at intermediate points.

3. Conclusion
• The conclusion summarizes the key findings of the review in
general terms. Notable commonalities between works, whether
favorable or not, may be included here.
• This section is the reviewer’s opportunity to justify a research
proposal. Therefore, the idea should be clearly restated and
supported according to the findings of the review.

The points to be taken care of in the conclusion are as follows:

⚫ Summarize major contributions of significant studies and articles to
the body of knowledge under review, maintaining the focus
established in the introduction.
⚫ Evaluate the current “state of the art” for the body of knowledge
reviewed, pointing out major methodological flaws or gaps in
research, inconsistencies in theory, and finding areas or issues
pertinent to future study.
⚫ Conclude by providing some insight into the relationship between
central topic of the literature.

4. References
• As well as accurate in-text citations, a literature review must
contain complete and correct citations for every source.

Points to be Considered in Writing Literature Review

➢ Be specific and be succinct

Researchers should briefly state specific findings listed in an article,
specific methodologies used in a study, or other important points.
Literature reviews are not the place for long quotes or in-depth analysis
of each point.

➢ Be selective
Researchers should narrow down a lot of information into a small space
for literature review. Just the most important points (i.e., those most
relevant to the review’s focus) must be mentioned in each work of
review.

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➢ Focus on current topics
Researchers need to analyze points such as if it is a current article, and
if not, how old it is: has its claims, evidence, or arguments been
superseded by more recent work?; if it is not current, then if it is important
for historical background, etc.

➢ Ensure evidence for claims

Researchers should focus on what support is given for claims made in
literature. What evidence and what type (experimental, statistical,
anecdotal, etc.) of evidences are offered? Is the evidence relevant and
sufficient? What arguments are given? What assumptions are made,
and are they warranted?

➢ Focus on sources of evidences

Researchers should ensure the reliability of the sources of the evidence
or other information – if they are from author’s own experiments, surveys,
historical records, government documents, etc. He should check how
reliable those sources are.

➢ Account of contrary evidences

Does the author take into account contrary or conflicting evidence and
arguments? How does the author address disagreements with other
researchers?

➢ Reference citation
Any references cited in the literature review must be included in the
bibliography. The common practice is that the reviewer does not list
references in the bibliography that are not directly cited in the literature
review or elsewhere in the paper/thesis.

➢ Avoid abbreviations
Avoid technical terms, jargons, and abbreviations.

➢ Simple and accurate sentence structure

Researchers should use simple sentences and must avoid errors of
grammar and punctuation.

➢ Organization of literature review

A literature review is organized by subtopic, not by individual references.
In a typical literature review, the writers may cite several references in
the same paragraph and may cite the same reference in more than
one paragraph, if that source addresses more than one of the subtopics
in the literature review. Typically, discussion of each sources is quite brief.
The contribution the present reviewers make is organizing the ideas from

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 the sources into a cogent argument or narrative that includes their
perspectives.

➢ Referring original source

The reviewer should focus on citing the material that originates with
each reference. This may require a careful reading of the reference. If
the reference author refers to another source whose ideas are relevant
or interesting, it is better to track and use that original reference.

Retrieved from: www.drjayeshpatidar.blogspot.com

Keep in Mind

Before the year ends, you need to come up with a research paper in
order to pass the subject. Please start constructing it as early as today.

Task 1.
Directions: Let us try to see how much you have learned from the discussion
above about writing the literature review. On your activitiy
notebook, write TRUE if the statement is correct and FALSE if it is
incorrect.

1. Secondary source research documents are description of studies

prepared by someone other than the original researcher.

2. Collecting as many previous researches, even if some do not relate to

your topic, is helpful in structuring your review of related literature.

3. Electronic databases can be resources for your review of related

literature.

4. A literature review is a compilation, classification, and evaluation of

what other researchers have written on a particular topic.

5. Grouping research studies and other types of literature (reviews,

theoretical articles, case studies) according to common denominators
is the first step in writing the body of the literature.

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What I Have Learned
POST-TEST:
Directions: Refering to your research topic, find reliable sources to include in
your review of related literature. Secure at least five (5) sources that
are published not later than 2010. Print them on a short size bond
paper and submit together with your research notebook on the
scheduled retrieval.

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