Doing Your Literature Review

Traditional and Systematic Techniques

Jill Jesson,Lydia Matheson,Fiona M Lacey

• Publisher: SAGE Publications Ltd
• Year: 2011
• ISBN:
  9781446242391
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Business General
• Index: Business

The literature review is a compulsory part of research and, increasingly, may form the whole of a student research project. This highly accessible book guides students through the production of either a traditional or a systematic literature review, clearly explaining the difference between the two types of review, the advantages and disadvantages of both, and the skills needed. It gives practical advice on reading and organising relevant literature and critically assessing the reviewed field. Contents include:

• using libraries and the internet
• note making
• presentation
• critical analysis
• referencing, plagiarism and copyright.

This book will be relevant to students from any discipline. It includes contributions from two lecturers who have many years experience of teaching research methods and the supervision of postgraduate research dissertations and a librarian, each offering expert advice on either the creation and assessment of literature reviews or the process of searching for information. The book also highlights the increasing importance for many disciplines of the systematic review methodology and discusses some of the specific challenges which it brings.

Jill K. Jesson has worked with multi-disciplinary research teams within the Aston School of Pharmacy, Aston Business School and with M-E-L Research, an independent public services research consultancy. She has now left Aston University and is working as a Consultant.

Lydia Matheson is an Information Specialist working for Library & Information Services at Aston University.

Fiona M. Lacey is an academic pharmacist, a member of the pharmacy practice teaching group in the School of Pharmacy, and Associate Dean in the School of Life and Health Sciences at Aston.

PART 1

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GETTING INFORMATION

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1

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PRELIMINARIES

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Key Points

• A literature review is a re-view of something that has already been written
• A traditional review can vary in format and style
• A systematic review is governed by a prescribed methodology – it is a research method and is used to address a specific research question
• It is possible to work systematically in your literature review, but that does not mean it is a systematic review

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What is a literature review?

This book is a guide to undertaking a literature review, in which we emphasise that the literature review can be a research method in its own right. We explain that the literature review is a written product; the format varies depending on the purpose of the review. In most instances, the review will be part of a research project and dissertation, but it can be a stand-alone review, one that is not a chapter in a research dissertation or thesis. We are interested in the process of creating a review. Much more attention has been focused on improving the quality of literature reviews, as awareness of the systematic review protocol, with a defined methodology, has raised expectations of what can be achieved by all of us when reviewing literature.

Since the promotion of systematic review as a specialist review in the fields of evidence-based practice, which uses a prescribed, systematic methodological approach, we have an alternative way to review the literature. The systematic review produces an output – for example, a statement of findings to inform policy development – that may not necessarily lead into new research.

The aim of this opening chapter is to present an overview focusing on the context of doing a literature review. We consider some scenarios when you might undertake a review of literature. There is a short discussion of the relationship between a research question and a research project. Literature review is a library or desk-based method involving the secondary analysis of explicit knowledge, so abstract concepts of explicit and tacit knowledge are explored. We critically examine the notion of peer review and challenge the faith placed on the peer review process. The chapter closes with guidance on project planning and time management.

Why do a literature review?

As an academic task the literature review is where you show that you are both aware of and can interpret what is already known and where eventually you will be able to point out the contradictions and gaps in existing knowledge. As with any piece of research, you will have to explain why your review is important, why it is different and what it adds to knowledge. In research, we seek to be original and to make an original contribution to knowledge. In the literature review context that means creating a new dimension or fresh perspective that makes a distinct contribution. There are many reasons for carrying out a literature review, so students should ensure that they are aware of what they are being asked to do and ensure that their review does what is required.

Taken as its simplest, traditional form a literature review is a ‘re-viewing’ of the literature. Every student will at some point in their academic career be asked to carry out a review of the literature, usually as part of completing a research project. Sometimes the task is just to carry out a review of the literature as a dissertation in its own right. So let’s begin with definitions.

Terminology used in this book

We need to have a common language to describe the different styles of literature review. Throughout the book we have labelled our two styles of review as ‘traditional literature review’ and ‘systematic review’ to differentiate them, although in practice the boundaries can be less marked. We will examine these two styles of review and then consider the word ‘systematic’ because this notion is often misunderstood and hence misused.

TASK

Look at the research method textbooks you are using and see how the term ‘literature review’ is defined.

Traditional literature review

A literature review is a written appraisal of what is already known – existing knowledge on a topic – with no prescribed methodology. Later in the book you will see that this basic model of a literature review can be complemented by a more scientifically prescribed model, the systematic review. Figure 1.1 represents the two types as ends of a continuum.

Figure 1.1 A continuum of literature review approaches

How is the literature review defined in other textbooks? The two examples which follow are taken from business research textbooks. First, Jankowitz (2005) emphasises the process of building on existing work, but with a focus on describing and then bringing the work together in a critical way. This illustrates a use of the concept or term ‘critical’.

There is little point in reinventing the wheel. Whatever your epistemology, the work that you do is not done in a vacuum, but builds on the ideas of other people who have studied the field before you. This requires you to describe what has been published and to marshal the information in a relevant and critical way. (Jankowitz, 2005: 161, emphasis added)

Writing at the same time, Blumberg et al. (2005, emphasis added) discuss the literature review and here the emphasis is on individual contribution – as interpretation: ‘An academic document which must have a logical structure, the aim and objectives and purpose need to be clear to the reader – it is an appropriate summary of previous work. But it needs an added dimension – your interpretation’.

Example 1.1 provides selected sentences from an article showing how the authors classify their review as a thematic analysis and state why it is not a systematic review.

Example 1.1

Recognising a traditional review. Extract taken from: ‘Is the increasing policy use of Impact Assessment (IA) in Europe likely to undermine efforts to achieve healthy public policy?’ (Smith et al., 2010)

This is an essay that provides a thematic analysis of literature concerning IA and associated tools and a related assessment of the European Union’s new integrated IA tool (2010: 478).

This essay takes a public health perspective in interpreting literature that critically examines Impact Assessment (IA) and related tools (namely cost–benefit analysis, CBA), which share the same basic elements as IA. This body of work is vast, divergent and largely theoretical, and not, therefore, appropriate for a traditional systematic review. (2010: 480, emphasis added)

Systematic review

As a contrast to a traditional review, a systematic review has been defined by Petticrew and Roberts (2006: 2) as: ‘A method of making sense of large bodies of information, and a means to contributing to the answers to questions about what works and what does not.’

We therefore define a systematic review as a review with a clear stated purpose, a question, a defined search approach, stating inclusion and exclusion criteria, producing a qualitative appraisal of articles. Example 1.2 illustrates a systematic review.

The systematic review method is prescribed. In this book (see Chapter 7), we describe six essential stages of methodology that you should work through in undertaking a systematic review:

1. Define the research question.
2. Design the plan.
3. Search for literature.
4. Apply exclusion and inclusion criteria.
5. Apply quality assessment.
6. Synthesis.

What does systematic mean?

Now let us consider the word ‘systematic’. To work systematically simply means to work in an ordered or methodical way, rather than in a haphazard or random way. So, as a researcher, you have to take a systematic approach to your learning and to your writing. But taking an ordered approach to doing your literature review does not mean that the review can be called a ‘systematic review’. It is possible to claim that you have taken a systematic approach to obtaining knowledge for your literature review, but without working through the six key stages of a systematic review protocol (see below) it cannot claim to be a systematic review.

Example 1.2

Recognising a systematic review. Extract taken from ‘Networking literature about determinants of network effectiveness’ (Turrini et al., 2010)

Abstract
In fact literature on this topic has been highly fragmented, comprising a plurality of definitions, multiple theories, multiple methods and multiple explanations. This paper aims to review and classify previous theoretical and evidence-based studies on network effectiveness and its determinants. (2010: 528)

We want to emphasise again that the terminology of literature review is confusing and ambiguous because as a subject or research method in its own right it is still in its infancy, in comparison, say, with the volume of books on qualitative research. We might say that the debate is still at an emergent stage. It is only relatively recently that academic journals in some fields began to publish literature reviews, because the view prevailed that literature was not based on research. So you can expect to see inconsistency in the language that authors use. Without getting into too much detail at this point (because the detail is in Chapter 7), we use recently published articles to illustrate the differences in terminology between Examples 1.1 and 1.2.

Example 1.1 is a review of the policy use of Impact Assessment in Europe. There is no clue in the title that this is a literature review. The clue is in the abstract, which tells the reader this is a thematic analysis. ‘Traditional’ in this context is used because the authors report that they did not conduct a comprehensive search of a specific topic or question, but used an iterative approach to search. A thematic approach was taken to analyse the texts. So the process defines the type of review.

Example 1.2 is a systematic review. The example includes all the review method terminology that you will encounter in such an article, based on the use of a protocol. Do not be put off at this point. Throughout the book we explain the terminology. If you want more clarification now, take a look at the glossary.

So, there is no clue in the title or abstract of Example 1.2 that this is a systematic review, however the authors do provide a methodology section. The authors designed a four step procedure (although we recommend six steps) to review the literature:

1. They defined key terms (inclusion) and the studies that were not to be included (exclusion).
2. They used key words to identify and collect all existing studies, search bibliographic databases and follow up citations.
3. They screened titles and abstracts.
4. They reduced their data, generated categories and produced final interpretation criteria.

From these two examples you should get the idea and be aware of the difference between the two styles of review.

Different styles of review

In order to study styles and types of literature review we have been collecting examples since 2000. An interesting outcome is that it is not always clear from the title or abstract that an article is a literature review until you skim read it, as in Example 1.1. Those articles that do classify themselves as literature reviews can use a confusing range of terminology, which in some cases is not explicitly defined by the authors in the text. The range of labels authors choose include: ‘a synthesis review’, ‘a narrative review’, ‘a critical literature review’, ‘a critical review’, ‘a review of the literature’, ‘a review’, ‘a systematic review’, ‘a systematic review of evidence’, ‘a rapid review’, ‘an integrated review’, ‘a thematic review’, ‘a content analysis’, and ‘a bibliometric overview’.

TASK

Take a look at any issue of the International Journal of Management Reviews and explore the wording of the titles. They are all reviews of one sort or another, but this is not necessarily flagged up in the title ...