Developing a Literature Review: Criteria and Types

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Research Methods & Professional Skills
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Introduction
Many academic scholars and researchers struggle when developing literature reviews.
For some, they do not follow the guidelines and criteria of developing a good literature review
leaving gaps in the dissertation they are working on. A literature review can be defined as a
comprehensive outline of all the theories and knowledge on a particular topic, up to the time of
carrying out the research. When working on a research topic, the first step involves carrying out
relevant research on the available topic to gain an insight on the previous work published about
the topic (Ramdhani, A Ramdhani, M, and Amin, 2014, pp.52. This ultimately translates to the
literature review when one is developing the research paper. A literature review looks into books,
journals, online resources, articles, and other relevant sources, and in so doing, it provides a
description, evaluation, and summary of the previous content about the topic (He and Brown,
2013, pp.10). It is developed in order to provide an overview of the information ones has
gathered from various sources about a particular topic, while demonstrating to the readers the
depth of your research and how it fits into the broader field of study. A literature review is a key
pillar on which the idea of the research stands. It enables the researcher to provide a background,
context, and relevance of the research problem one is exploring.
When developing a literature review, it is critical to think of knowledge as having three
layers. The first is the primary studies that need to be conducted regarding the topic. Secondly,
one should consider the reviews of the topic that either summarizes the topic or offer a new
interpretation of the original content (Bronstein and Kovacs, 2013, pp.358). The third layer is the
opinions, interpretations, perceptions, and conclusions that are informally shared and become
part of the researched field. This third layer is the one often regarded in the literature review
although it has a minimal connection to the primary studies and secondary reviews. From this,

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the researcher can establish several approaches and forms of literature reviews. The
argumentative review explores literature for the purpose of supporting or refuting it (Okoli, C.,
2015, pp.37). This review establishes a contrarian viewpoint. One critical disadvantage of this
kind of literature review is that it can result in bias when used in making summary claims.
Integrative review critiques, reviews and synthesizes a literature topic in an integrative manner to
develop new frameworks and perspectives regarding a topic (Bocken, Short, Rana and Evans,
2014, pp.500. The body of studies in this kind of reviews addresses identical hypothesis and is of
the same standard as the primary research. Historical review, on the other hand, examines
research done through a period of time, starting from when the issue was first conceptualized and
emerged in literature (Bavdekar and Save, 2015, pp.45). Historical review traces the evolution of
an issue. It places the research within the context of history, and show developments as well as
the likely direction the research may take in the future. The methodological review provides an
understanding of different phenomena such as data collection and analysis technique, and
research approaches (Hamari, Koivisto and Sarsa, 2014, pp.3030). It enables the researcher to
gain an insight on a wide array of knowledge, including practical documentation to use in the
fieldwork in epistemological and ontological consideration, qualitative and quantitative
integration, data collection, interviewing and data analysis. It highlights the ethical issues that the
researcher needs to consider when caring out data collection and the overall research (Mancini,
et al., 2014, pp.478). Systematic review focus on empirical questions on a very specific level. It
is often stipulated in the cause and effect manner for example, ‘to what extent does a
phenomenon relate to another.’ Theoretical reviews examines the theories that have accumulated
regarding the research field under review (Bjerke and Renger, 2017, pp.126). It points out at the

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already existing theories, the relationship between them, to what extent they have been
investigated, and how can new hypotheses be tested.
In developing a literature review, the following criteria should be followed. First, the
overall structure should include; an overview of the subject, theory, and issues under
investigation, and the objectives of the literature review. The review should be divided into
reviews, categories, and themes. Additionally, there should be comparing and contrasting
different works. The researcher should conclude by outlining which works should be best
considered in the argument, in making the best understanding and contribution to the area of
research. It is important for the researcher to carry out a critical evaluation of the work that is to
be included in the literature review (Torraco, 2016, pp.410). The researcher should consider
provenance by checking the credentials of the author, and whether the arguments are supported
by evidence. Objectivity should also be factored in the evaluation by analyzing the perspective of
the author and establishing contrary data has been considered all the information is biased to
prove the viewpoint of the author. Persuasiveness checks for convincing theses of the author will
value outlines whether the conclusion is convincing or not (Hei and David, 2015, pp.140). The
researcher should then choose the type of review that he wants to discuss. This is after outlining
the type of information sources that are available. In choosing the type of review, one should
consider the research topic. It is also important to establish whether to carry out a mini or a full
review based on factors such as the type of audience one is targeting (Pickering and Byrne, 2014,
pp.540). For example, if the audience are busy people with strict schedules, the researcher should
opt for a mini-review by summarizing key points (Paré, Trudel, Jaana and Kitsiou, 2015,
pp.190). The development of the literature review should follow four critical stages. The first
stage is the problem formulation which outlines the topic to be studied. Literature search