Writing a Literature Review: Basic Principles and Guidelines

I never understood the purpose of a lit review until I had written about ten of them myself. Thankfully, that meant that I was never taught any inane rules for what to include or how to do it. I'm not sure teachers and professors are helpful to students when they explain how to write literature reviews without having published any themselves.

I've published several dozen and I've reviewed several dozen more and understand the most common mistakes. I've also seen what students believe qualifies as a lit review. Here's my take:

Purpose of a Lit Review

As I see it, there are four main goals of a literature review. They are interrelated.

1. Introduce Your Topic

At the very least, your literature review must introduce your topic of your study. This means that any concepts used in your study must be defined and described in the lit review. For instance, if you're going to be testing the effects of THC consumption on college student achievement metrics, then you'll want to introduce THC consumption among college students and any nuances there; you'll want to describe ordinary achievement metrics and any nuances there; you'll want to introduce your theoretical foundations (such as which theory of motivation or student success you're focused on).

In other words, there shouldn't be any surprises in store for you reader once they reach your design and methodology sections.

2. Give Necessary Background

To continue the example above of studying the effects of THC consumption on college student success, there might important background knowledge a reader will need to understand the importance of your study. For example, is THC usage any higher now than it was 20 years ago? Has the decriminalization of THC products led to increased usage? How do college students feel about THC. How about college administrators and professors?

This background information will help your reader get the inside scoop on your topic, and it will prepare them for how your study will contribute to knowledge.

3. Build on Other Work

As Isaac Newton has said (perhaps quoting someone else): I see as far as I can because I am standing on the shoulders of giants. 

Part of writing your literature review is to give credit where it is due. You accomplish this by acknowledging the work of others from which you have benefited. These are like tiny credits for researchers. Each time you mention a new study of theirs, they get another citation to their name. This is like scholarly currency in academe.

4. Prepare Your Audience

I've said it already in the above three goals, but I'll say it again here: your literature review will prepare your audience to understand your study design and your contribution. I actually think that if your lit review is perfect, then your readers will a) thirst for your contribution and b) be able to predict your design.

Guiding Principles for Writing Your Lit Review

Broad Scope

Because the objective of the literature review is to prepare your audience for your contribution, it is important that you do not attempt to make your contribution in the lit review! That is to say, the lit review is not your time to shine; it is a time to shine a light on the foundation upon which you will be building. If you spend all of your time focused on some hyper-specific area of that foundation, then your reader will wonder why the article isn't focused solely on said hyper-specific area.

As yourself, "What did I need to understand in order to design my study the way I have designed it?" Then make a list. For example, what did I need to know before studying First Generation College Students?

1. I had to understand how FGCS had been defined as a concept, and how there were widely diverging ways of determining it.
2. I had to understand how FGCS was a demographic that had its own impact on student achievement that wasn't due to related factors such as SES, race, or level of college preparation.
3. I discovered that I also had to understand that FGCS were extremely likely to also experience imposter phenomenon. This ended up being a main focus, and so it go approximately half of the lit review. 
4. And I wanted to show the other work that had been done and how it helped shape my study (or failed to help).
5. Finally, the method I used was unusual in the journal, so I shared a bit more about its theoretical foundations than I ordinarily would in a lit review. (Read my FGCS study here.)

It might be interesting that a study conducted in Southern California examined the effectiveness of first year experience courses for FGCS, but that doesn't mean I should devote five paragraphs to what happened in the study. I might just say, "Researchers found that first year experience courses were helpful to FGCS by increasing retention rates among FGCS (citation)." That's it. I don't need to say anything more than that.

Balanced

Lit reviews should also be balanced. By balanced, I mean that each sub-section of the lit review should be approximately the same length and have approximately the same number of citations. This shows evenness of attention and balance of focus. Too much attention on any one area will indicate to your reader that said area will be more important than the others.

Adequately Prepare Your Readers

By the time your readers reach your study's design, they should have no questions left that you're not prepared to answer in the study.

General Principles for Writing Your Lit Review

Understand Where Your Lit Review Fits Into the Article

I always title my lit review "Introduction," which reminds me that my only goal is introducing the subject matter and preparing my audience to understand my (hopefully impressive) contribution.

Be Brief.

Give only the briefest summaries or references of studies. A few citations may merit more attention, but these should always be in service to introducing your study.

It Isn't the Time To Showcase Your Scholarly Acumen

Don’t worry about proving yourself. Your expertise will come through in how you handle your subject matter, what questions you ask, where you focus your time, and so on. Giving your opinion on whether a previous study was good or poor is irrelevant. If it's poor, then ignore it. If it's good, then use it. You don't need to show off how good you are at reading or how much you've read. Just be informed, then draw on that.

The only thing you CAN showcase is your writing style, which at this point in a scholarly article means clear and straightforward. No cute adjectives or adverbs. No vague references such as, "Everybody knows that..." or, "Since the beginning of time..." or, "It's a heartbreaking statistics that...".

Most of Your References will be Parenthetical

To help with writing economy (getting the most out of the fewest words possible), don't give titles of studies or where the authors got their PhDs. Remember, if you're using it, then it's probably good. By avoiding the formal introduction of all the scholars in your reference list, you're saving space for more important writing. There might be a handful of scholars who merit direct quotes in your paper. The deciding factor should always be that they say it better than you can. There's no other magic to using direct quotes.

Use Subsections

Organize your review into subsections. Focus on one point at a time. Be methodical. The subsections help you do these things.

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