literature survey and literature review are same

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Differences Between a Literature Review and a Literature Survey

Literature reviews and surveys are crucial tools scholars use in academic research to contextualize their work. While these terms are often used interchangeably, they have distinct roles and purposes. This blog post aims to elucidate the differences between a literature review and a literature survey. We will explore their definitions, objectives, methodologies, and applications. Researchers can better utilize these tools to enhance their studies by understanding these distinctions.

Literature Review and Literature Survey

What is a literature review.

A literature review comprehensively synthesizes previous research on a specific topic. It involves critically analyzing and evaluating existing literature and identifying trends, gaps, and inconsistencies. The purpose is to provide a thorough understanding of the research landscape, establish the context for new research, and justify the need for further investigation.

What is a Literature Survey?

A literature survey is a more straightforward compilation of existing studies related to a particular research question or area. It involves collecting and summarizing relevant sources without the depth of critical analysis in literature reviews. The primary objective is to gather information and present an overview of what has been done in the field.

A literature survey is what others found about the topic, and a literature review is what you think about those findings in the context of your topic.

Objectives and Purposes

Objectives of a literature review.

• Contextualization : A literature review situates new research within the existing body of knowledge.
• Critical Analysis : It critically evaluates the strengths and weaknesses of past studies.
• Identification of Gaps : It identifies gaps in the current knowledge that new research can address.
• Theoretical Foundation : It establishes a theoretical framework for new research.

Objectives of a Literature Survey

• Information Gathering : A literature survey aims to gather existing information on a topic.
• Overview Provision : It provides an overview of the current state of research without extensive analysis.
• Foundation for Further Research : This is a preliminary step in identifying sources for a more detailed literature review or other research activities.

Methodologies

Methodology of a literature review.

A literature review involves several systematic steps:

• Defining Scope : Determine the specific focus and scope of the review.
• Searching for Literature : Use databases, journals, and other sources to find relevant literature.
• Selecting Sources : Choose sources based on relevance, credibility, and quality.
• Analyzing and Synthesizing : Critically analyze and synthesize the findings, identifying patterns and themes.
• Writing the Review : Organize the analysis into a coherent narrative highlighting key findings, debates, and gaps.

Methodology of a Literature Survey

A literature survey follows a more straightforward approach:

• Identifying Research Question : Define the specific question or topic of interest.
• Collecting Sources : Gather all relevant sources without a stringent selection process.
• Summarizing Findings : Summarize the key points from each source.
• Organizing Information : Present the summaries logically, often chronologically or thematically.

Applications and Uses

Applications of a literature review.

• Academic Research: establishes a foundation for theses, dissertations, and scholarly articles.
• Grant Proposals : Justify the need for funding by highlighting gaps in the current research.
• Policy Development : Informs policy decisions by comprehensively understanding the research landscape.

Applications of a Literature Survey

• Preliminary Research : Serves as a starting point for researchers new to a field.
• Project Planning : Helps in planning research projects by providing an overview of existing studies.
• Educational Purposes : Used in coursework to familiarize students with a particular area of study.

Critical Analysis vs. Summary

Critical analysis in literature reviews.

Literature reviews involve a deep critical analysis where researchers assess previous studies’ methodologies, findings, and implications. This process helps to identify strengths, weaknesses, and biases in the existing literature. By doing so, researchers can construct a solid theoretical foundation for their work, highlight areas needing further investigation, and ensure their research contributes novel insights to the field.

Summary in Literature Surveys

In contrast, literature surveys focus on summarizing existing research without extensive critique. This method is helpful for quickly understanding what has been done in a field. However, it does not provide the depth of analysis needed to engage with the literature critically. Thus, while useful for initial exploration, literature surveys are often supplemented by more detailed reviews in comprehensive research projects.

Integration into Research Projects

Literature reviews in research projects.

In research projects, literature reviews are integral to the introduction and theoretical framework sections. They help establish the context for the research, justify the research questions, and demonstrate the researcher’s expertise in the field. Researchers can position their work within the ongoing scholarly conversation by critically engaging with the literature, ensuring its relevance and impact.

Literature Surveys in Research Projects

Literature surveys are often used in the early stages of research projects. They provide a broad overview of the field, helping researchers to understand the landscape and identify relevant sources. While not as detailed as literature reviews, surveys can inform the development of research questions and hypotheses, providing a foundation for more in-depth analysis later in the project.

Understanding the differences between literature reviews and surveys is essential for effective academic research. While both tools gather and present information on a specific topic, they serve distinct purposes and involve different methodologies. A literature review offers a comprehensive, critical analysis of existing research, providing a robust foundation for new studies. In contrast, a literature survey provides a broad overview of existing literature, serving as a preliminary step in the research process. By recognizing these differences, researchers can choose the appropriate tool for their needs, enhancing the quality and impact of their work.

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• How to Write a Literature Review | Guide, Examples, & Templates

How to Write a Literature Review | Guide, Examples, & Templates

Published on January 2, 2023 by Shona McCombes . Revised on September 11, 2023.

What is a literature review? A literature review is a survey of scholarly sources on a specific topic. It provides an overview of current knowledge, allowing you to identify relevant theories, methods, and gaps in the existing research that you can later apply to your paper, thesis, or dissertation topic .

There are five key steps to writing a literature review:

• Search for relevant literature
• Evaluate sources
• Identify themes, debates, and gaps
• Outline the structure
• Write your literature review

A good literature review doesn’t just summarize sources—it analyzes, synthesizes , and critically evaluates to give a clear picture of the state of knowledge on the subject.

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Table of contents

What is the purpose of a literature review, examples of literature reviews, step 1 – search for relevant literature, step 2 – evaluate and select sources, step 3 – identify themes, debates, and gaps, step 4 – outline your literature review’s structure, step 5 – write your literature review, free lecture slides, other interesting articles, frequently asked questions, introduction.

• Quick Run-through
• Step 1 & 2

When you write a thesis , dissertation , or research paper , you will likely have to conduct a literature review to situate your research within existing knowledge. The literature review gives you a chance to:

• Demonstrate your familiarity with the topic and its scholarly context
• Develop a theoretical framework and methodology for your research
• Position your work in relation to other researchers and theorists
• Show how your research addresses a gap or contributes to a debate
• Evaluate the current state of research and demonstrate your knowledge of the scholarly debates around your topic.

Writing literature reviews is a particularly important skill if you want to apply for graduate school or pursue a career in research. We’ve written a step-by-step guide that you can follow below.

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Writing literature reviews can be quite challenging! A good starting point could be to look at some examples, depending on what kind of literature review you’d like to write.

• Example literature review #1: “Why Do People Migrate? A Review of the Theoretical Literature” ( Theoretical literature review about the development of economic migration theory from the 1950s to today.)
• Example literature review #2: “Literature review as a research methodology: An overview and guidelines” ( Methodological literature review about interdisciplinary knowledge acquisition and production.)
• Example literature review #3: “The Use of Technology in English Language Learning: A Literature Review” ( Thematic literature review about the effects of technology on language acquisition.)
• Example literature review #4: “Learners’ Listening Comprehension Difficulties in English Language Learning: A Literature Review” ( Chronological literature review about how the concept of listening skills has changed over time.)

You can also check out our templates with literature review examples and sample outlines at the links below.

Download Word doc Download Google doc

Before you begin searching for literature, you need a clearly defined topic .

If you are writing the literature review section of a dissertation or research paper, you will search for literature related to your research problem and questions .

Make a list of keywords

Start by creating a list of keywords related to your research question. Include each of the key concepts or variables you’re interested in, and list any synonyms and related terms. You can add to this list as you discover new keywords in the process of your literature search.

• Social media, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, TikTok
• Body image, self-perception, self-esteem, mental health
• Generation Z, teenagers, adolescents, youth

Search for relevant sources

Use your keywords to begin searching for sources. Some useful databases to search for journals and articles include:

• Your university’s library catalogue
• Google Scholar
• Project Muse (humanities and social sciences)
• Medline (life sciences and biomedicine)
• EconLit (economics)
• Inspec (physics, engineering and computer science)

You can also use boolean operators to help narrow down your search.

Make sure to read the abstract to find out whether an article is relevant to your question. When you find a useful book or article, you can check the bibliography to find other relevant sources.

You likely won’t be able to read absolutely everything that has been written on your topic, so it will be necessary to evaluate which sources are most relevant to your research question.

For each publication, ask yourself:

• What question or problem is the author addressing?
• What are the key concepts and how are they defined?
• What are the key theories, models, and methods?
• Does the research use established frameworks or take an innovative approach?
• What are the results and conclusions of the study?
• How does the publication relate to other literature in the field? Does it confirm, add to, or challenge established knowledge?
• What are the strengths and weaknesses of the research?

Make sure the sources you use are credible , and make sure you read any landmark studies and major theories in your field of research.

You can use our template to summarize and evaluate sources you’re thinking about using. Click on either button below to download.

Take notes and cite your sources

As you read, you should also begin the writing process. Take notes that you can later incorporate into the text of your literature review.

It is important to keep track of your sources with citations to avoid plagiarism . It can be helpful to make an annotated bibliography , where you compile full citation information and write a paragraph of summary and analysis for each source. This helps you remember what you read and saves time later in the process.

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To begin organizing your literature review’s argument and structure, be sure you understand the connections and relationships between the sources you’ve read. Based on your reading and notes, you can look for:

• Trends and patterns (in theory, method or results): do certain approaches become more or less popular over time?
• Themes: what questions or concepts recur across the literature?
• Debates, conflicts and contradictions: where do sources disagree?
• Pivotal publications: are there any influential theories or studies that changed the direction of the field?
• Gaps: what is missing from the literature? Are there weaknesses that need to be addressed?

This step will help you work out the structure of your literature review and (if applicable) show how your own research will contribute to existing knowledge.

• Most research has focused on young women.
• There is an increasing interest in the visual aspects of social media.
• But there is still a lack of robust research on highly visual platforms like Instagram and Snapchat—this is a gap that you could address in your own research.

There are various approaches to organizing the body of a literature review. Depending on the length of your literature review, you can combine several of these strategies (for example, your overall structure might be thematic, but each theme is discussed chronologically).

Chronological

The simplest approach is to trace the development of the topic over time. However, if you choose this strategy, be careful to avoid simply listing and summarizing sources in order.

Try to analyze patterns, turning points and key debates that have shaped the direction of the field. Give your interpretation of how and why certain developments occurred.

If you have found some recurring central themes, you can organize your literature review into subsections that address different aspects of the topic.

For example, if you are reviewing literature about inequalities in migrant health outcomes, key themes might include healthcare policy, language barriers, cultural attitudes, legal status, and economic access.

Methodological

If you draw your sources from different disciplines or fields that use a variety of research methods , you might want to compare the results and conclusions that emerge from different approaches. For example:

• Look at what results have emerged in qualitative versus quantitative research
• Discuss how the topic has been approached by empirical versus theoretical scholarship
• Divide the literature into sociological, historical, and cultural sources

Theoretical

A literature review is often the foundation for a theoretical framework . You can use it to discuss various theories, models, and definitions of key concepts.

You might argue for the relevance of a specific theoretical approach, or combine various theoretical concepts to create a framework for your research.

Like any other academic text , your literature review should have an introduction , a main body, and a conclusion . What you include in each depends on the objective of your literature review.

The introduction should clearly establish the focus and purpose of the literature review.

Depending on the length of your literature review, you might want to divide the body into subsections. You can use a subheading for each theme, time period, or methodological approach.

As you write, you can follow these tips:

• Summarize and synthesize: give an overview of the main points of each source and combine them into a coherent whole
• Analyze and interpret: don’t just paraphrase other researchers — add your own interpretations where possible, discussing the significance of findings in relation to the literature as a whole
• Critically evaluate: mention the strengths and weaknesses of your sources
• Write in well-structured paragraphs: use transition words and topic sentences to draw connections, comparisons and contrasts

In the conclusion, you should summarize the key findings you have taken from the literature and emphasize their significance.

When you’ve finished writing and revising your literature review, don’t forget to proofread thoroughly before submitting. Not a language expert? Check out Scribbr’s professional proofreading services !

This article has been adapted into lecture slides that you can use to teach your students about writing a literature review.

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If you want to know more about the research process , methodology , research bias , or statistics , make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples.

• Sampling methods
• Simple random sampling
• Stratified sampling
• Cluster sampling
• Likert scales
• Reproducibility

 Statistics

• Null hypothesis
• Statistical power
• Probability distribution
• Effect size
• Poisson distribution

Research bias

• Optimism bias
• Cognitive bias
• Implicit bias
• Hawthorne effect
• Anchoring bias
• Explicit bias

A literature review is a survey of scholarly sources (such as books, journal articles, and theses) related to a specific topic or research question .

It is often written as part of a thesis, dissertation , or research paper , in order to situate your work in relation to existing knowledge.

There are several reasons to conduct a literature review at the beginning of a research project:

• To familiarize yourself with the current state of knowledge on your topic
• To ensure that you’re not just repeating what others have already done
• To identify gaps in knowledge and unresolved problems that your research can address
• To develop your theoretical framework and methodology
• To provide an overview of the key findings and debates on the topic

Writing the literature review shows your reader how your work relates to existing research and what new insights it will contribute.

The literature review usually comes near the beginning of your thesis or dissertation . After the introduction , it grounds your research in a scholarly field and leads directly to your theoretical framework or methodology .

A literature review is a survey of credible sources on a topic, often used in dissertations , theses, and research papers . Literature reviews give an overview of knowledge on a subject, helping you identify relevant theories and methods, as well as gaps in existing research. Literature reviews are set up similarly to other  academic texts , with an introduction , a main body, and a conclusion .

An  annotated bibliography is a list of  source references that has a short description (called an annotation ) for each of the sources. It is often assigned as part of the research process for a  paper .  

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A literature review is a document or section of a document that collects key sources on a topic and discusses those sources in conversation with each other (also called synthesis ). The lit review is an important genre in many disciplines, not just literature (i.e., the study of works of literature such as novels and plays). When we say “literature review” or refer to “the literature,” we are talking about the research ( scholarship ) in a given field. You will often see the terms “the research,” “the scholarship,” and “the literature” used mostly interchangeably.

Where, when, and why would I write a lit review?

There are a number of different situations where you might write a literature review, each with slightly different expectations; different disciplines, too, have field-specific expectations for what a literature review is and does. For instance, in the humanities, authors might include more overt argumentation and interpretation of source material in their literature reviews, whereas in the sciences, authors are more likely to report study designs and results in their literature reviews; these differences reflect these disciplines’ purposes and conventions in scholarship. You should always look at examples from your own discipline and talk to professors or mentors in your field to be sure you understand your discipline’s conventions, for literature reviews as well as for any other genre.

A literature review can be a part of a research paper or scholarly article, usually falling after the introduction and before the research methods sections. In these cases, the lit review just needs to cover scholarship that is important to the issue you are writing about; sometimes it will also cover key sources that informed your research methodology.

Lit reviews can also be standalone pieces, either as assignments in a class or as publications. In a class, a lit review may be assigned to help students familiarize themselves with a topic and with scholarship in their field, get an idea of the other researchers working on the topic they’re interested in, find gaps in existing research in order to propose new projects, and/or develop a theoretical framework and methodology for later research. As a publication, a lit review usually is meant to help make other scholars’ lives easier by collecting and summarizing, synthesizing, and analyzing existing research on a topic. This can be especially helpful for students or scholars getting into a new research area, or for directing an entire community of scholars toward questions that have not yet been answered.

What are the parts of a lit review?

Most lit reviews use a basic introduction-body-conclusion structure; if your lit review is part of a larger paper, the introduction and conclusion pieces may be just a few sentences while you focus most of your attention on the body. If your lit review is a standalone piece, the introduction and conclusion take up more space and give you a place to discuss your goals, research methods, and conclusions separately from where you discuss the literature itself.

Introduction:

• An introductory paragraph that explains what your working topic and thesis is
• A forecast of key topics or texts that will appear in the review
• Potentially, a description of how you found sources and how you analyzed them for inclusion and discussion in the review (more often found in published, standalone literature reviews than in lit review sections in an article or research paper)
• Summarize and synthesize: Give an overview of the main points of each source and combine them into a coherent whole
• Analyze and interpret: Don’t just paraphrase other researchers – add your own interpretations where possible, discussing the significance of findings in relation to the literature as a whole
• Critically Evaluate: Mention the strengths and weaknesses of your sources
• Write in well-structured paragraphs: Use transition words and topic sentence to draw connections, comparisons, and contrasts.

Conclusion:

• Summarize the key findings you have taken from the literature and emphasize their significance
• Connect it back to your primary research question

How should I organize my lit review?

Lit reviews can take many different organizational patterns depending on what you are trying to accomplish with the review. Here are some examples:

• Chronological : The simplest approach is to trace the development of the topic over time, which helps familiarize the audience with the topic (for instance if you are introducing something that is not commonly known in your field). If you choose this strategy, be careful to avoid simply listing and summarizing sources in order. Try to analyze the patterns, turning points, and key debates that have shaped the direction of the field. Give your interpretation of how and why certain developments occurred (as mentioned previously, this may not be appropriate in your discipline — check with a teacher or mentor if you’re unsure).
• Thematic : If you have found some recurring central themes that you will continue working with throughout your piece, you can organize your literature review into subsections that address different aspects of the topic. For example, if you are reviewing literature about women and religion, key themes can include the role of women in churches and the religious attitude towards women.
• Qualitative versus quantitative research
• Empirical versus theoretical scholarship
• Divide the research by sociological, historical, or cultural sources
• Theoretical : In many humanities articles, the literature review is the foundation for the theoretical framework. You can use it to discuss various theories, models, and definitions of key concepts. You can argue for the relevance of a specific theoretical approach or combine various theorical concepts to create a framework for your research.

What are some strategies or tips I can use while writing my lit review?

Any lit review is only as good as the research it discusses; make sure your sources are well-chosen and your research is thorough. Don’t be afraid to do more research if you discover a new thread as you’re writing. More info on the research process is available in our "Conducting Research" resources .

As you’re doing your research, create an annotated bibliography ( see our page on the this type of document ). Much of the information used in an annotated bibliography can be used also in a literature review, so you’ll be not only partially drafting your lit review as you research, but also developing your sense of the larger conversation going on among scholars, professionals, and any other stakeholders in your topic.

Usually you will need to synthesize research rather than just summarizing it. This means drawing connections between sources to create a picture of the scholarly conversation on a topic over time. Many student writers struggle to synthesize because they feel they don’t have anything to add to the scholars they are citing; here are some strategies to help you:

• It often helps to remember that the point of these kinds of syntheses is to show your readers how you understand your research, to help them read the rest of your paper.
• Writing teachers often say synthesis is like hosting a dinner party: imagine all your sources are together in a room, discussing your topic. What are they saying to each other?
• Look at the in-text citations in each paragraph. Are you citing just one source for each paragraph? This usually indicates summary only. When you have multiple sources cited in a paragraph, you are more likely to be synthesizing them (not always, but often
• Read more about synthesis here.

The most interesting literature reviews are often written as arguments (again, as mentioned at the beginning of the page, this is discipline-specific and doesn’t work for all situations). Often, the literature review is where you can establish your research as filling a particular gap or as relevant in a particular way. You have some chance to do this in your introduction in an article, but the literature review section gives a more extended opportunity to establish the conversation in the way you would like your readers to see it. You can choose the intellectual lineage you would like to be part of and whose definitions matter most to your thinking (mostly humanities-specific, but this goes for sciences as well). In addressing these points, you argue for your place in the conversation, which tends to make the lit review more compelling than a simple reporting of other sources.

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A literature review surveys prior research published in books, scholarly articles, and any other sources relevant to a particular issue, area of research, or theory, and by so doing, provides a description, summary, and critical evaluation of these works in relation to the research problem being investigated. Literature reviews are designed to provide an overview of sources you have used in researching a particular topic and to demonstrate to your readers how your research fits within existing scholarship about the topic.

Fink, Arlene. Conducting Research Literature Reviews: From the Internet to Paper . Fourth edition. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE, 2014.

Importance of a Good Literature Review

A literature review may consist of simply a summary of key sources, but in the social sciences, a literature review usually has an organizational pattern and combines both summary and synthesis, often within specific conceptual categories . A summary is a recap of the important information of the source, but a synthesis is a re-organization, or a reshuffling, of that information in a way that informs how you are planning to investigate a research problem. The analytical features of a literature review might:

• Give a new interpretation of old material or combine new with old interpretations,
• Trace the intellectual progression of the field, including major debates,
• Depending on the situation, evaluate the sources and advise the reader on the most pertinent or relevant research, or
• Usually in the conclusion of a literature review, identify where gaps exist in how a problem has been researched to date.

Given this, the purpose of a literature review is to:

• Place each work in the context of its contribution to understanding the research problem being studied.
• Describe the relationship of each work to the others under consideration.
• Identify new ways to interpret prior research.
• Reveal any gaps that exist in the literature.
• Resolve conflicts amongst seemingly contradictory previous studies.
• Identify areas of prior scholarship to prevent duplication of effort.
• Point the way in fulfilling a need for additional research.
• Locate your own research within the context of existing literature [very important].

Fink, Arlene. Conducting Research Literature Reviews: From the Internet to Paper. 2nd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2005; Hart, Chris. Doing a Literature Review: Releasing the Social Science Research Imagination . Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 1998; Jesson, Jill. Doing Your Literature Review: Traditional and Systematic Techniques . Los Angeles, CA: SAGE, 2011; Knopf, Jeffrey W. "Doing a Literature Review." PS: Political Science and Politics 39 (January 2006): 127-132; Ridley, Diana. The Literature Review: A Step-by-Step Guide for Students . 2nd ed. Los Angeles, CA: SAGE, 2012.

Types of Literature Reviews

It is important to think of knowledge in a given field as consisting of three layers. First, there are the primary studies that researchers conduct and publish. Second are the reviews of those studies that summarize and offer new interpretations built from and often extending beyond the primary studies. Third, there are the perceptions, conclusions, opinion, and interpretations that are shared informally among scholars that become part of the body of epistemological traditions within the field.

In composing a literature review, it is important to note that it is often this third layer of knowledge that is cited as "true" even though it often has only a loose relationship to the primary studies and secondary literature reviews. Given this, while literature reviews are designed to provide an overview and synthesis of pertinent sources you have explored, there are a number of approaches you could adopt depending upon the type of analysis underpinning your study.

Argumentative Review This form examines literature selectively in order to support or refute an argument, deeply embedded assumption, or philosophical problem already established in the literature. The purpose is to develop a body of literature that establishes a contrarian viewpoint. Given the value-laden nature of some social science research [e.g., educational reform; immigration control], argumentative approaches to analyzing the literature can be a legitimate and important form of discourse. However, note that they can also introduce problems of bias when they are used to make summary claims of the sort found in systematic reviews [see below].

Integrative Review Considered a form of research that reviews, critiques, and synthesizes representative literature on a topic in an integrated way such that new frameworks and perspectives on the topic are generated. The body of literature includes all studies that address related or identical hypotheses or research problems. A well-done integrative review meets the same standards as primary research in regard to clarity, rigor, and replication. This is the most common form of review in the social sciences.

Historical Review Few things rest in isolation from historical precedent. Historical literature reviews focus on examining research throughout a period of time, often starting with the first time an issue, concept, theory, phenomena emerged in the literature, then tracing its evolution within the scholarship of a discipline. The purpose is to place research in a historical context to show familiarity with state-of-the-art developments and to identify the likely directions for future research.

Methodological Review A review does not always focus on what someone said [findings], but how they came about saying what they say [method of analysis]. Reviewing methods of analysis provides a framework of understanding at different levels [i.e. those of theory, substantive fields, research approaches, and data collection and analysis techniques], how researchers draw upon a wide variety of knowledge ranging from the conceptual level to practical documents for use in fieldwork in the areas of ontological and epistemological consideration, quantitative and qualitative integration, sampling, interviewing, data collection, and data analysis. This approach helps highlight ethical issues which you should be aware of and consider as you go through your own study.

Systematic Review This form consists of an overview of existing evidence pertinent to a clearly formulated research question, which uses pre-specified and standardized methods to identify and critically appraise relevant research, and to collect, report, and analyze data from the studies that are included in the review. The goal is to deliberately document, critically evaluate, and summarize scientifically all of the research about a clearly defined research problem . Typically it focuses on a very specific empirical question, often posed in a cause-and-effect form, such as "To what extent does A contribute to B?" This type of literature review is primarily applied to examining prior research studies in clinical medicine and allied health fields, but it is increasingly being used in the social sciences.

Theoretical Review The purpose of this form is to examine the corpus of theory that has accumulated in regard to an issue, concept, theory, phenomena. The theoretical literature review helps to establish what theories already exist, the relationships between them, to what degree the existing theories have been investigated, and to develop new hypotheses to be tested. Often this form is used to help establish a lack of appropriate theories or reveal that current theories are inadequate for explaining new or emerging research problems. The unit of analysis can focus on a theoretical concept or a whole theory or framework.

NOTE: Most often the literature review will incorporate some combination of types. For example, a review that examines literature supporting or refuting an argument, assumption, or philosophical problem related to the research problem will also need to include writing supported by sources that establish the history of these arguments in the literature.

Baumeister, Roy F. and Mark R. Leary. "Writing Narrative Literature Reviews."  Review of General Psychology 1 (September 1997): 311-320; Mark R. Fink, Arlene. Conducting Research Literature Reviews: From the Internet to Paper . 2nd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2005; Hart, Chris. Doing a Literature Review: Releasing the Social Science Research Imagination . Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 1998; Kennedy, Mary M. "Defining a Literature." Educational Researcher 36 (April 2007): 139-147; Petticrew, Mark and Helen Roberts. Systematic Reviews in the Social Sciences: A Practical Guide . Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishers, 2006; Torracro, Richard. "Writing Integrative Literature Reviews: Guidelines and Examples." Human Resource Development Review 4 (September 2005): 356-367; Rocco, Tonette S. and Maria S. Plakhotnik. "Literature Reviews, Conceptual Frameworks, and Theoretical Frameworks: Terms, Functions, and Distinctions." Human Ressource Development Review 8 (March 2008): 120-130; Sutton, Anthea. Systematic Approaches to a Successful Literature Review . Los Angeles, CA: Sage Publications, 2016.

Structure and Writing Style

I.  Thinking About Your Literature Review

The structure of a literature review should include the following in support of understanding the research problem :

• An overview of the subject, issue, or theory under consideration, along with the objectives of the literature review,
• Division of works under review into themes or categories [e.g. works that support a particular position, those against, and those offering alternative approaches entirely],
• An explanation of how each work is similar to and how it varies from the others,
• Conclusions as to which pieces are best considered in their argument, are most convincing of their opinions, and make the greatest contribution to the understanding and development of their area of research.

The critical evaluation of each work should consider :

• Provenance -- what are the author's credentials? Are the author's arguments supported by evidence [e.g. primary historical material, case studies, narratives, statistics, recent scientific findings]?
• Methodology -- were the techniques used to identify, gather, and analyze the data appropriate to addressing the research problem? Was the sample size appropriate? Were the results effectively interpreted and reported?
• Objectivity -- is the author's perspective even-handed or prejudicial? Is contrary data considered or is certain pertinent information ignored to prove the author's point?
• Persuasiveness -- which of the author's theses are most convincing or least convincing?
• Validity -- are the author's arguments and conclusions convincing? Does the work ultimately contribute in any significant way to an understanding of the subject?

II.  Development of the Literature Review

Four Basic Stages of Writing 1.  Problem formulation -- which topic or field is being examined and what are its component issues? 2.  Literature search -- finding materials relevant to the subject being explored. 3.  Data evaluation -- determining which literature makes a significant contribution to the understanding of the topic. 4.  Analysis and interpretation -- discussing the findings and conclusions of pertinent literature.

Consider the following issues before writing the literature review: Clarify If your assignment is not specific about what form your literature review should take, seek clarification from your professor by asking these questions: 1.  Roughly how many sources would be appropriate to include? 2.  What types of sources should I review (books, journal articles, websites; scholarly versus popular sources)? 3.  Should I summarize, synthesize, or critique sources by discussing a common theme or issue? 4.  Should I evaluate the sources in any way beyond evaluating how they relate to understanding the research problem? 5.  Should I provide subheadings and other background information, such as definitions and/or a history? Find Models Use the exercise of reviewing the literature to examine how authors in your discipline or area of interest have composed their literature review sections. Read them to get a sense of the types of themes you might want to look for in your own research or to identify ways to organize your final review. The bibliography or reference section of sources you've already read, such as required readings in the course syllabus, are also excellent entry points into your own research. Narrow the Topic The narrower your topic, the easier it will be to limit the number of sources you need to read in order to obtain a good survey of relevant resources. Your professor will probably not expect you to read everything that's available about the topic, but you'll make the act of reviewing easier if you first limit scope of the research problem. A good strategy is to begin by searching the USC Libraries Catalog for recent books about the topic and review the table of contents for chapters that focuses on specific issues. You can also review the indexes of books to find references to specific issues that can serve as the focus of your research. For example, a book surveying the history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict may include a chapter on the role Egypt has played in mediating the conflict, or look in the index for the pages where Egypt is mentioned in the text. Consider Whether Your Sources are Current Some disciplines require that you use information that is as current as possible. This is particularly true in disciplines in medicine and the sciences where research conducted becomes obsolete very quickly as new discoveries are made. However, when writing a review in the social sciences, a survey of the history of the literature may be required. In other words, a complete understanding the research problem requires you to deliberately examine how knowledge and perspectives have changed over time. Sort through other current bibliographies or literature reviews in the field to get a sense of what your discipline expects. You can also use this method to explore what is considered by scholars to be a "hot topic" and what is not.

III.  Ways to Organize Your Literature Review

Chronology of Events If your review follows the chronological method, you could write about the materials according to when they were published. This approach should only be followed if a clear path of research building on previous research can be identified and that these trends follow a clear chronological order of development. For example, a literature review that focuses on continuing research about the emergence of German economic power after the fall of the Soviet Union. By Publication Order your sources by publication chronology, then, only if the order demonstrates a more important trend. For instance, you could order a review of literature on environmental studies of brown fields if the progression revealed, for example, a change in the soil collection practices of the researchers who wrote and/or conducted the studies. Thematic [“conceptual categories”] A thematic literature review is the most common approach to summarizing prior research in the social and behavioral sciences. Thematic reviews are organized around a topic or issue, rather than the progression of time, although the progression of time may still be incorporated into a thematic review. For example, a review of the Internet’s impact on American presidential politics could focus on the development of online political satire. While the study focuses on one topic, the Internet’s impact on American presidential politics, it would still be organized chronologically reflecting technological developments in media. The difference in this example between a "chronological" and a "thematic" approach is what is emphasized the most: themes related to the role of the Internet in presidential politics. Note that more authentic thematic reviews tend to break away from chronological order. A review organized in this manner would shift between time periods within each section according to the point being made. Methodological A methodological approach focuses on the methods utilized by the researcher. For the Internet in American presidential politics project, one methodological approach would be to look at cultural differences between the portrayal of American presidents on American, British, and French websites. Or the review might focus on the fundraising impact of the Internet on a particular political party. A methodological scope will influence either the types of documents in the review or the way in which these documents are discussed.

Other Sections of Your Literature Review Once you've decided on the organizational method for your literature review, the sections you need to include in the paper should be easy to figure out because they arise from your organizational strategy. In other words, a chronological review would have subsections for each vital time period; a thematic review would have subtopics based upon factors that relate to the theme or issue. However, sometimes you may need to add additional sections that are necessary for your study, but do not fit in the organizational strategy of the body. What other sections you include in the body is up to you. However, only include what is necessary for the reader to locate your study within the larger scholarship about the research problem.

Here are examples of other sections, usually in the form of a single paragraph, you may need to include depending on the type of review you write:

• Current Situation : Information necessary to understand the current topic or focus of the literature review.
• Sources Used : Describes the methods and resources [e.g., databases] you used to identify the literature you reviewed.
• History : The chronological progression of the field, the research literature, or an idea that is necessary to understand the literature review, if the body of the literature review is not already a chronology.
• Selection Methods : Criteria you used to select (and perhaps exclude) sources in your literature review. For instance, you might explain that your review includes only peer-reviewed [i.e., scholarly] sources.
• Standards : Description of the way in which you present your information.
• Questions for Further Research : What questions about the field has the review sparked? How will you further your research as a result of the review?

IV.  Writing Your Literature Review

Once you've settled on how to organize your literature review, you're ready to write each section. When writing your review, keep in mind these issues.

Use Evidence A literature review section is, in this sense, just like any other academic research paper. Your interpretation of the available sources must be backed up with evidence [citations] that demonstrates that what you are saying is valid. Be Selective Select only the most important points in each source to highlight in the review. The type of information you choose to mention should relate directly to the research problem, whether it is thematic, methodological, or chronological. Related items that provide additional information, but that are not key to understanding the research problem, can be included in a list of further readings . Use Quotes Sparingly Some short quotes are appropriate if you want to emphasize a point, or if what an author stated cannot be easily paraphrased. Sometimes you may need to quote certain terminology that was coined by the author, is not common knowledge, or taken directly from the study. Do not use extensive quotes as a substitute for using your own words in reviewing the literature. Summarize and Synthesize Remember to summarize and synthesize your sources within each thematic paragraph as well as throughout the review. Recapitulate important features of a research study, but then synthesize it by rephrasing the study's significance and relating it to your own work and the work of others. Keep Your Own Voice While the literature review presents others' ideas, your voice [the writer's] should remain front and center. For example, weave references to other sources into what you are writing but maintain your own voice by starting and ending the paragraph with your own ideas and wording. Use Caution When Paraphrasing When paraphrasing a source that is not your own, be sure to represent the author's information or opinions accurately and in your own words. Even when paraphrasing an author’s work, you still must provide a citation to that work.

V.  Common Mistakes to Avoid

These are the most common mistakes made in reviewing social science research literature.

• Sources in your literature review do not clearly relate to the research problem;
• You do not take sufficient time to define and identify the most relevant sources to use in the literature review related to the research problem;
• Relies exclusively on secondary analytical sources rather than including relevant primary research studies or data;
• Uncritically accepts another researcher's findings and interpretations as valid, rather than examining critically all aspects of the research design and analysis;
• Does not describe the search procedures that were used in identifying the literature to review;
• Reports isolated statistical results rather than synthesizing them in chi-squared or meta-analytic methods; and,
• Only includes research that validates assumptions and does not consider contrary findings and alternative interpretations found in the literature.

Cook, Kathleen E. and Elise Murowchick. “Do Literature Review Skills Transfer from One Course to Another?” Psychology Learning and Teaching 13 (March 2014): 3-11; Fink, Arlene. Conducting Research Literature Reviews: From the Internet to Paper . 2nd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2005; Hart, Chris. Doing a Literature Review: Releasing the Social Science Research Imagination . Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 1998; Jesson, Jill. Doing Your Literature Review: Traditional and Systematic Techniques . London: SAGE, 2011; Literature Review Handout. Online Writing Center. Liberty University; Literature Reviews. The Writing Center. University of North Carolina; Onwuegbuzie, Anthony J. and Rebecca Frels. Seven Steps to a Comprehensive Literature Review: A Multimodal and Cultural Approach . Los Angeles, CA: SAGE, 2016; Ridley, Diana. The Literature Review: A Step-by-Step Guide for Students . 2nd ed. Los Angeles, CA: SAGE, 2012; Randolph, Justus J. “A Guide to Writing the Dissertation Literature Review." Practical Assessment, Research, and Evaluation. vol. 14, June 2009; Sutton, Anthea. Systematic Approaches to a Successful Literature Review . Los Angeles, CA: Sage Publications, 2016; Taylor, Dena. The Literature Review: A Few Tips On Conducting It. University College Writing Centre. University of Toronto; Writing a Literature Review. Academic Skills Centre. University of Canberra.

Writing Tip

Break Out of Your Disciplinary Box!

Thinking interdisciplinarily about a research problem can be a rewarding exercise in applying new ideas, theories, or concepts to an old problem. For example, what might cultural anthropologists say about the continuing conflict in the Middle East? In what ways might geographers view the need for better distribution of social service agencies in large cities than how social workers might study the issue? You don’t want to substitute a thorough review of core research literature in your discipline for studies conducted in other fields of study. However, particularly in the social sciences, thinking about research problems from multiple vectors is a key strategy for finding new solutions to a problem or gaining a new perspective. Consult with a librarian about identifying research databases in other disciplines; almost every field of study has at least one comprehensive database devoted to indexing its research literature.

Frodeman, Robert. The Oxford Handbook of Interdisciplinarity . New York: Oxford University Press, 2010.

Another Writing Tip

Don't Just Review for Content!

While conducting a review of the literature, maximize the time you devote to writing this part of your paper by thinking broadly about what you should be looking for and evaluating. Review not just what scholars are saying, but how are they saying it. Some questions to ask:

• How are they organizing their ideas?
• What methods have they used to study the problem?
• What theories have been used to explain, predict, or understand their research problem?
• What sources have they cited to support their conclusions?
• How have they used non-textual elements [e.g., charts, graphs, figures, etc.] to illustrate key points?

When you begin to write your literature review section, you'll be glad you dug deeper into how the research was designed and constructed because it establishes a means for developing more substantial analysis and interpretation of the research problem.

Hart, Chris. Doing a Literature Review: Releasing the Social Science Research Imagination . Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 1 998.

Yet Another Writing Tip

When Do I Know I Can Stop Looking and Move On?

Here are several strategies you can utilize to assess whether you've thoroughly reviewed the literature:

• Look for repeating patterns in the research findings . If the same thing is being said, just by different people, then this likely demonstrates that the research problem has hit a conceptual dead end. At this point consider: Does your study extend current research?  Does it forge a new path? Or, does is merely add more of the same thing being said?
• Look at sources the authors cite to in their work . If you begin to see the same researchers cited again and again, then this is often an indication that no new ideas have been generated to address the research problem.
• Search Google Scholar to identify who has subsequently cited leading scholars already identified in your literature review [see next sub-tab]. This is called citation tracking and there are a number of sources that can help you identify who has cited whom, particularly scholars from outside of your discipline. Here again, if the same authors are being cited again and again, this may indicate no new literature has been written on the topic.

Onwuegbuzie, Anthony J. and Rebecca Frels. Seven Steps to a Comprehensive Literature Review: A Multimodal and Cultural Approach . Los Angeles, CA: Sage, 2016; Sutton, Anthea. Systematic Approaches to a Successful Literature Review . Los Angeles, CA: Sage Publications, 2016.

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• UConn Library
• Literature Review: The What, Why and How-to Guide
• Introduction

Literature Review: The What, Why and How-to Guide — Introduction

• Getting Started
• How to Pick a Topic
• Strategies to Find Sources
• Evaluating Sources & Lit. Reviews
• Tips for Writing Literature Reviews
• Writing Literature Review: Useful Sites
• Citation Resources
• Other Academic Writings

What are Literature Reviews?

So, what is a literature review? "A literature review is an account of what has been published on a topic by accredited scholars and researchers. In writing the literature review, your purpose is to convey to your reader what knowledge and ideas have been established on a topic, and what their strengths and weaknesses are. As a piece of writing, the literature review must be defined by a guiding concept (e.g., your research objective, the problem or issue you are discussing, or your argumentative thesis). It is not just a descriptive list of the material available, or a set of summaries." Taylor, D.  The literature review: A few tips on conducting it . University of Toronto Health Sciences Writing Centre.

Goals of Literature Reviews

What are the goals of creating a Literature Review?  A literature could be written to accomplish different aims:

• To develop a theory or evaluate an existing theory
• To summarize the historical or existing state of a research topic
• Identify a problem in a field of research 

Baumeister, R. F., & Leary, M. R. (1997). Writing narrative literature reviews .  Review of General Psychology , 1 (3), 311-320.

What kinds of sources require a Literature Review?

• A research paper assigned in a course
• A thesis or dissertation
• A grant proposal
• An article intended for publication in a journal

All these instances require you to collect what has been written about your research topic so that you can demonstrate how your own research sheds new light on the topic.

Types of Literature Reviews

What kinds of literature reviews are written?

Narrative review: The purpose of this type of review is to describe the current state of the research on a specific topic/research and to offer a critical analysis of the literature reviewed. Studies are grouped by research/theoretical categories, and themes and trends, strengths and weakness, and gaps are identified. The review ends with a conclusion section which summarizes the findings regarding the state of the research of the specific study, the gaps identify and if applicable, explains how the author's research will address gaps identify in the review and expand the knowledge on the topic reviewed.

• Example : Predictors and Outcomes of U.S. Quality Maternity Leave: A Review and Conceptual Framework:  10.1177/08948453211037398  

Systematic review : "The authors of a systematic review use a specific procedure to search the research literature, select the studies to include in their review, and critically evaluate the studies they find." (p. 139). Nelson, L. K. (2013). Research in Communication Sciences and Disorders . Plural Publishing.

• Example : The effect of leave policies on increasing fertility: a systematic review:  10.1057/s41599-022-01270-w

Meta-analysis : "Meta-analysis is a method of reviewing research findings in a quantitative fashion by transforming the data from individual studies into what is called an effect size and then pooling and analyzing this information. The basic goal in meta-analysis is to explain why different outcomes have occurred in different studies." (p. 197). Roberts, M. C., & Ilardi, S. S. (2003). Handbook of Research Methods in Clinical Psychology . Blackwell Publishing.

• Example : Employment Instability and Fertility in Europe: A Meta-Analysis:  10.1215/00703370-9164737

Meta-synthesis : "Qualitative meta-synthesis is a type of qualitative study that uses as data the findings from other qualitative studies linked by the same or related topic." (p.312). Zimmer, L. (2006). Qualitative meta-synthesis: A question of dialoguing with texts .  Journal of Advanced Nursing , 53 (3), 311-318.

• Example : Women’s perspectives on career successes and barriers: A qualitative meta-synthesis:  10.1177/05390184221113735

Literature Reviews in the Health Sciences

• UConn Health subject guide on systematic reviews Explanation of the different review types used in health sciences literature as well as tools to help you find the right review type
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What Is A Literature Review?

A plain-language explainer (with examples).

By:  Derek Jansen (MBA) & Kerryn Warren (PhD) | June 2020 (Updated May 2023)

If you’re faced with writing a dissertation or thesis, chances are you’ve encountered the term “literature review” . If you’re on this page, you’re probably not 100% what the literature review is all about. The good news is that you’ve come to the right place.

Literature Review 101

• What (exactly) is a literature review
• What’s the purpose of the literature review chapter
• How to find high-quality resources
• How to structure your literature review chapter
• Example of an actual literature review

What is a literature review?

The word “literature review” can refer to two related things that are part of the broader literature review process. The first is the task of  reviewing the literature  – i.e. sourcing and reading through the existing research relating to your research topic. The second is the  actual chapter  that you write up in your dissertation, thesis or research project. Let’s look at each of them:

Reviewing the literature

The first step of any literature review is to hunt down and  read through the existing research  that’s relevant to your research topic. To do this, you’ll use a combination of tools (we’ll discuss some of these later) to find journal articles, books, ebooks, research reports, dissertations, theses and any other credible sources of information that relate to your topic. You’ll then  summarise and catalogue these  for easy reference when you write up your literature review chapter. 

The literature review chapter

The second step of the literature review is to write the actual literature review chapter (this is usually the second chapter in a typical dissertation or thesis structure ). At the simplest level, the literature review chapter is an  overview of the key literature  that’s relevant to your research topic. This chapter should provide a smooth-flowing discussion of what research has already been done, what is known, what is unknown and what is contested in relation to your research topic. So, you can think of it as an  integrated review of the state of knowledge  around your research topic. 

What’s the purpose of a literature review?

The literature review chapter has a few important functions within your dissertation, thesis or research project. Let’s take a look at these:

Purpose #1 – Demonstrate your topic knowledge

The first function of the literature review chapter is, quite simply, to show the reader (or marker) that you  know what you’re talking about . In other words, a good literature review chapter demonstrates that you’ve read the relevant existing research and understand what’s going on – who’s said what, what’s agreed upon, disagreed upon and so on. This needs to be  more than just a summary  of who said what – it needs to integrate the existing research to  show how it all fits together  and what’s missing (which leads us to purpose #2, next). 

Purpose #2 – Reveal the research gap that you’ll fill

The second function of the literature review chapter is to  show what’s currently missing  from the existing research, to lay the foundation for your own research topic. In other words, your literature review chapter needs to show that there are currently “missing pieces” in terms of the bigger puzzle, and that  your study will fill one of those research gaps . By doing this, you are showing that your research topic is original and will help contribute to the body of knowledge. In other words, the literature review helps justify your research topic.  

Purpose #3 – Lay the foundation for your conceptual framework

The third function of the literature review is to form the  basis for a conceptual framework . Not every research topic will necessarily have a conceptual framework, but if your topic does require one, it needs to be rooted in your literature review. 

For example, let’s say your research aims to identify the drivers of a certain outcome – the factors which contribute to burnout in office workers. In this case, you’d likely develop a conceptual framework which details the potential factors (e.g. long hours, excessive stress, etc), as well as the outcome (burnout). Those factors would need to emerge from the literature review chapter – they can’t just come from your gut! 

So, in this case, the literature review chapter would uncover each of the potential factors (based on previous studies about burnout), which would then be modelled into a framework. 

Purpose #4 – To inform your methodology

The fourth function of the literature review is to  inform the choice of methodology  for your own research. As we’ve  discussed on the Grad Coach blog , your choice of methodology will be heavily influenced by your research aims, objectives and questions . Given that you’ll be reviewing studies covering a topic close to yours, it makes sense that you could learn a lot from their (well-considered) methodologies.

So, when you’re reviewing the literature, you’ll need to  pay close attention to the research design , methodology and methods used in similar studies, and use these to inform your methodology. Quite often, you’ll be able to  “borrow” from previous studies . This is especially true for quantitative studies , as you can use previously tried and tested measures and scales. 

How do I find articles for my literature review?

Finding quality journal articles is essential to crafting a rock-solid literature review. As you probably already know, not all research is created equally, and so you need to make sure that your literature review is  built on credible research . 

We could write an entire post on how to find quality literature (actually, we have ), but a good starting point is Google Scholar . Google Scholar is essentially the academic equivalent of Google, using Google’s powerful search capabilities to find relevant journal articles and reports. It certainly doesn’t cover every possible resource, but it’s a very useful way to get started on your literature review journey, as it will very quickly give you a good indication of what the  most popular pieces of research  are in your field.

One downside of Google Scholar is that it’s merely a search engine – that is, it lists the articles, but oftentimes  it doesn’t host the articles . So you’ll often hit a paywall when clicking through to journal websites. 

Thankfully, your university should provide you with access to their library, so you can find the article titles using Google Scholar and then search for them by name in your university’s online library. Your university may also provide you with access to  ResearchGate , which is another great source for existing research. 

Remember, the correct search keywords will be super important to get the right information from the start. So, pay close attention to the keywords used in the journal articles you read and use those keywords to search for more articles. If you can’t find a spoon in the kitchen, you haven’t looked in the right drawer. 

Need a helping hand?

How should I structure my literature review?

Unfortunately, there’s no generic universal answer for this one. The structure of your literature review will depend largely on your topic area and your research aims and objectives.

You could potentially structure your literature review chapter according to theme, group, variables , chronologically or per concepts in your field of research. We explain the main approaches to structuring your literature review here . You can also download a copy of our free literature review template to help you establish an initial structure.

In general, it’s also a good idea to start wide (i.e. the big-picture-level) and then narrow down, ending your literature review close to your research questions . However, there’s no universal one “right way” to structure your literature review. The most important thing is not to discuss your sources one after the other like a list – as we touched on earlier, your literature review needs to synthesise the research , not summarise it .

Ultimately, you need to craft your literature review so that it conveys the most important information effectively – it needs to tell a logical story in a digestible way. It’s no use starting off with highly technical terms and then only explaining what these terms mean later. Always assume your reader is not a subject matter expert and hold their hand through a journe y of the literature while keeping the functions of the literature review chapter (which we discussed earlier) front of mind.

Example of a literature review

In the video below, we walk you through a high-quality literature review from a dissertation that earned full distinction. This will give you a clearer view of what a strong literature review looks like in practice and hopefully provide some inspiration for your own. 

Wrapping Up

In this post, we’ve (hopefully) answered the question, “ what is a literature review? “. We’ve also considered the purpose and functions of the literature review, as well as how to find literature and how to structure the literature review chapter. If you’re keen to learn more, check out the literature review section of the Grad Coach blog , as well as our detailed video post covering how to write a literature review . 

Psst… there’s more!

This post is an extract from our bestselling short course, Literature Review Bootcamp . If you want to work smart, you don't want to miss this .

16 Comments

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• What is a Literature Review? | Guide, Template, & Examples

What is a Literature Review? | Guide, Template, & Examples

Published on 22 February 2022 by Shona McCombes . Revised on 7 June 2022.

What is a literature review? A literature review is a survey of scholarly sources on a specific topic. It provides an overview of current knowledge, allowing you to identify relevant theories, methods, and gaps in the existing research.

There are five key steps to writing a literature review:

• Search for relevant literature
• Evaluate sources
• Identify themes, debates and gaps
• Outline the structure
• Write your literature review

A good literature review doesn’t just summarise sources – it analyses, synthesises, and critically evaluates to give a clear picture of the state of knowledge on the subject.

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Table of contents

Why write a literature review, examples of literature reviews, step 1: search for relevant literature, step 2: evaluate and select sources, step 3: identify themes, debates and gaps, step 4: outline your literature review’s structure, step 5: write your literature review, frequently asked questions about literature reviews, introduction.

• Quick Run-through
• Step 1 & 2

When you write a dissertation or thesis, you will have to conduct a literature review to situate your research within existing knowledge. The literature review gives you a chance to:

• Demonstrate your familiarity with the topic and scholarly context
• Develop a theoretical framework and methodology for your research
• Position yourself in relation to other researchers and theorists
• Show how your dissertation addresses a gap or contributes to a debate

You might also have to write a literature review as a stand-alone assignment. In this case, the purpose is to evaluate the current state of research and demonstrate your knowledge of scholarly debates around a topic.

The content will look slightly different in each case, but the process of conducting a literature review follows the same steps. We’ve written a step-by-step guide that you can follow below.

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Writing literature reviews can be quite challenging! A good starting point could be to look at some examples, depending on what kind of literature review you’d like to write.

• Example literature review #1: “Why Do People Migrate? A Review of the Theoretical Literature” ( Theoretical literature review about the development of economic migration theory from the 1950s to today.)
• Example literature review #2: “Literature review as a research methodology: An overview and guidelines” ( Methodological literature review about interdisciplinary knowledge acquisition and production.)
• Example literature review #3: “The Use of Technology in English Language Learning: A Literature Review” ( Thematic literature review about the effects of technology on language acquisition.)
• Example literature review #4: “Learners’ Listening Comprehension Difficulties in English Language Learning: A Literature Review” ( Chronological literature review about how the concept of listening skills has changed over time.)

You can also check out our templates with literature review examples and sample outlines at the links below.

Download Word doc Download Google doc

Before you begin searching for literature, you need a clearly defined topic .

If you are writing the literature review section of a dissertation or research paper, you will search for literature related to your research objectives and questions .

If you are writing a literature review as a stand-alone assignment, you will have to choose a focus and develop a central question to direct your search. Unlike a dissertation research question, this question has to be answerable without collecting original data. You should be able to answer it based only on a review of existing publications.

Make a list of keywords

Start by creating a list of keywords related to your research topic. Include each of the key concepts or variables you’re interested in, and list any synonyms and related terms. You can add to this list if you discover new keywords in the process of your literature search.

• Social media, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, TikTok
• Body image, self-perception, self-esteem, mental health
• Generation Z, teenagers, adolescents, youth

Search for relevant sources

Use your keywords to begin searching for sources. Some databases to search for journals and articles include:

• Your university’s library catalogue
• Google Scholar
• Project Muse (humanities and social sciences)
• Medline (life sciences and biomedicine)
• EconLit (economics)
• Inspec (physics, engineering and computer science)

You can use boolean operators to help narrow down your search:

Read the abstract to find out whether an article is relevant to your question. When you find a useful book or article, you can check the bibliography to find other relevant sources.

To identify the most important publications on your topic, take note of recurring citations. If the same authors, books or articles keep appearing in your reading, make sure to seek them out.

You probably won’t be able to read absolutely everything that has been written on the topic – you’ll have to evaluate which sources are most relevant to your questions.

For each publication, ask yourself:

• What question or problem is the author addressing?
• What are the key concepts and how are they defined?
• What are the key theories, models and methods? Does the research use established frameworks or take an innovative approach?
• What are the results and conclusions of the study?
• How does the publication relate to other literature in the field? Does it confirm, add to, or challenge established knowledge?
• How does the publication contribute to your understanding of the topic? What are its key insights and arguments?
• What are the strengths and weaknesses of the research?

Make sure the sources you use are credible, and make sure you read any landmark studies and major theories in your field of research.

You can find out how many times an article has been cited on Google Scholar – a high citation count means the article has been influential in the field, and should certainly be included in your literature review.

The scope of your review will depend on your topic and discipline: in the sciences you usually only review recent literature, but in the humanities you might take a long historical perspective (for example, to trace how a concept has changed in meaning over time).

Remember that you can use our template to summarise and evaluate sources you’re thinking about using!

Take notes and cite your sources

As you read, you should also begin the writing process. Take notes that you can later incorporate into the text of your literature review.

It’s important to keep track of your sources with references to avoid plagiarism . It can be helpful to make an annotated bibliography, where you compile full reference information and write a paragraph of summary and analysis for each source. This helps you remember what you read and saves time later in the process.

You can use our free APA Reference Generator for quick, correct, consistent citations.

Prevent plagiarism, run a free check.

To begin organising your literature review’s argument and structure, you need to understand the connections and relationships between the sources you’ve read. Based on your reading and notes, you can look for:

• Trends and patterns (in theory, method or results): do certain approaches become more or less popular over time?
• Themes: what questions or concepts recur across the literature?
• Debates, conflicts and contradictions: where do sources disagree?
• Pivotal publications: are there any influential theories or studies that changed the direction of the field?
• Gaps: what is missing from the literature? Are there weaknesses that need to be addressed?

This step will help you work out the structure of your literature review and (if applicable) show how your own research will contribute to existing knowledge.

• Most research has focused on young women.
• There is an increasing interest in the visual aspects of social media.
• But there is still a lack of robust research on highly-visual platforms like Instagram and Snapchat – this is a gap that you could address in your own research.

There are various approaches to organising the body of a literature review. You should have a rough idea of your strategy before you start writing.

Depending on the length of your literature review, you can combine several of these strategies (for example, your overall structure might be thematic, but each theme is discussed chronologically).

Chronological

The simplest approach is to trace the development of the topic over time. However, if you choose this strategy, be careful to avoid simply listing and summarising sources in order.

Try to analyse patterns, turning points and key debates that have shaped the direction of the field. Give your interpretation of how and why certain developments occurred.

If you have found some recurring central themes, you can organise your literature review into subsections that address different aspects of the topic.

For example, if you are reviewing literature about inequalities in migrant health outcomes, key themes might include healthcare policy, language barriers, cultural attitudes, legal status, and economic access.

Methodological

If you draw your sources from different disciplines or fields that use a variety of research methods , you might want to compare the results and conclusions that emerge from different approaches. For example:

• Look at what results have emerged in qualitative versus quantitative research
• Discuss how the topic has been approached by empirical versus theoretical scholarship
• Divide the literature into sociological, historical, and cultural sources

Theoretical

A literature review is often the foundation for a theoretical framework . You can use it to discuss various theories, models, and definitions of key concepts.

You might argue for the relevance of a specific theoretical approach, or combine various theoretical concepts to create a framework for your research.

Like any other academic text, your literature review should have an introduction , a main body, and a conclusion . What you include in each depends on the objective of your literature review.

The introduction should clearly establish the focus and purpose of the literature review.

If you are writing the literature review as part of your dissertation or thesis, reiterate your central problem or research question and give a brief summary of the scholarly context. You can emphasise the timeliness of the topic (“many recent studies have focused on the problem of x”) or highlight a gap in the literature (“while there has been much research on x, few researchers have taken y into consideration”).

Depending on the length of your literature review, you might want to divide the body into subsections. You can use a subheading for each theme, time period, or methodological approach.

As you write, make sure to follow these tips:

• Summarise and synthesise: give an overview of the main points of each source and combine them into a coherent whole.
• Analyse and interpret: don’t just paraphrase other researchers – add your own interpretations, discussing the significance of findings in relation to the literature as a whole.
• Critically evaluate: mention the strengths and weaknesses of your sources.
• Write in well-structured paragraphs: use transitions and topic sentences to draw connections, comparisons and contrasts.

In the conclusion, you should summarise the key findings you have taken from the literature and emphasise their significance.

If the literature review is part of your dissertation or thesis, reiterate how your research addresses gaps and contributes new knowledge, or discuss how you have drawn on existing theories and methods to build a framework for your research. This can lead directly into your methodology section.

A literature review is a survey of scholarly sources (such as books, journal articles, and theses) related to a specific topic or research question .

It is often written as part of a dissertation , thesis, research paper , or proposal .

There are several reasons to conduct a literature review at the beginning of a research project:

• To familiarise yourself with the current state of knowledge on your topic
• To ensure that you’re not just repeating what others have already done
• To identify gaps in knowledge and unresolved problems that your research can address
• To develop your theoretical framework and methodology
• To provide an overview of the key findings and debates on the topic

Writing the literature review shows your reader how your work relates to existing research and what new insights it will contribute.

The literature review usually comes near the beginning of your  dissertation . After the introduction , it grounds your research in a scholarly field and leads directly to your theoretical framework or methodology .

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Research Methods

• Getting Started
• Literature Review Research
• Research Design
• Research Design By Discipline
• SAGE Research Methods
• Teaching with SAGE Research Methods

Literature Review

• What is a Literature Review?
• What is NOT a Literature Review?
• Purposes of a Literature Review
• Types of Literature Reviews
• Literature Reviews vs. Systematic Reviews
• Systematic vs. Meta-Analysis

Literature Review  is a comprehensive survey of the works published in a particular field of study or line of research, usually over a specific period of time, in the form of an in-depth, critical bibliographic essay or annotated list in which attention is drawn to the most significant works.

Also, we can define a literature review as the collected body of scholarly works related to a topic:

• Summarizes and analyzes previous research relevant to a topic
• Includes scholarly books and articles published in academic journals
• Can be an specific scholarly paper or a section in a research paper

The objective of a Literature Review is to find previous published scholarly works relevant to an specific topic

• Help gather ideas or information
• Keep up to date in current trends and findings
• Help develop new questions

A literature review is important because it:

• Explains the background of research on a topic.
• Demonstrates why a topic is significant to a subject area.
• Helps focus your own research questions or problems
• Discovers relationships between research studies/ideas.
• Suggests unexplored ideas or populations
• Identifies major themes, concepts, and researchers on a topic.
• Tests assumptions; may help counter preconceived ideas and remove unconscious bias.
• Identifies critical gaps, points of disagreement, or potentially flawed methodology or theoretical approaches.
• Indicates potential directions for future research.

All content in this section is from Literature Review Research from Old Dominion University 

Keep in mind the following, a literature review is NOT:

Not an essay 

Not an annotated bibliography  in which you summarize each article that you have reviewed.  A literature review goes beyond basic summarizing to focus on the critical analysis of the reviewed works and their relationship to your research question.

Not a research paper   where you select resources to support one side of an issue versus another.  A lit review should explain and consider all sides of an argument in order to avoid bias, and areas of agreement and disagreement should be highlighted.

A literature review serves several purposes. For example, it

• provides thorough knowledge of previous studies; introduces seminal works.
• helps focus one’s own research topic.
• identifies a conceptual framework for one’s own research questions or problems; indicates potential directions for future research.
• suggests previously unused or underused methodologies, designs, quantitative and qualitative strategies.
• identifies gaps in previous studies; identifies flawed methodologies and/or theoretical approaches; avoids replication of mistakes.
• helps the researcher avoid repetition of earlier research.
• suggests unexplored populations.
• determines whether past studies agree or disagree; identifies controversy in the literature.
• tests assumptions; may help counter preconceived ideas and remove unconscious bias.

As Kennedy (2007) notes*, it is important to think of knowledge in a given field as consisting of three layers. First, there are the primary studies that researchers conduct and publish. Second are the reviews of those studies that summarize and offer new interpretations built from and often extending beyond the original studies. Third, there are the perceptions, conclusions, opinion, and interpretations that are shared informally that become part of the lore of field. In composing a literature review, it is important to note that it is often this third layer of knowledge that is cited as "true" even though it often has only a loose relationship to the primary studies and secondary literature reviews.

Given this, while literature reviews are designed to provide an overview and synthesis of pertinent sources you have explored, there are several approaches to how they can be done, depending upon the type of analysis underpinning your study. Listed below are definitions of types of literature reviews:

Argumentative Review      This form examines literature selectively in order to support or refute an argument, deeply imbedded assumption, or philosophical problem already established in the literature. The purpose is to develop a body of literature that establishes a contrarian viewpoint. Given the value-laden nature of some social science research [e.g., educational reform; immigration control], argumentative approaches to analyzing the literature can be a legitimate and important form of discourse. However, note that they can also introduce problems of bias when they are used to to make summary claims of the sort found in systematic reviews.

Integrative Review      Considered a form of research that reviews, critiques, and synthesizes representative literature on a topic in an integrated way such that new frameworks and perspectives on the topic are generated. The body of literature includes all studies that address related or identical hypotheses. A well-done integrative review meets the same standards as primary research in regard to clarity, rigor, and replication.

Historical Review      Few things rest in isolation from historical precedent. Historical reviews are focused on examining research throughout a period of time, often starting with the first time an issue, concept, theory, phenomena emerged in the literature, then tracing its evolution within the scholarship of a discipline. The purpose is to place research in a historical context to show familiarity with state-of-the-art developments and to identify the likely directions for future research.

Methodological Review      A review does not always focus on what someone said [content], but how they said it [method of analysis]. This approach provides a framework of understanding at different levels (i.e. those of theory, substantive fields, research approaches and data collection and analysis techniques), enables researchers to draw on a wide variety of knowledge ranging from the conceptual level to practical documents for use in fieldwork in the areas of ontological and epistemological consideration, quantitative and qualitative integration, sampling, interviewing, data collection and data analysis, and helps highlight many ethical issues which we should be aware of and consider as we go through our study.

Systematic Review      This form consists of an overview of existing evidence pertinent to a clearly formulated research question, which uses pre-specified and standardized methods to identify and critically appraise relevant research, and to collect, report, and analyse data from the studies that are included in the review. Typically it focuses on a very specific empirical question, often posed in a cause-and-effect form, such as "To what extent does A contribute to B?"

Theoretical Review      The purpose of this form is to concretely examine the corpus of theory that has accumulated in regard to an issue, concept, theory, phenomena. The theoretical literature review help establish what theories already exist, the relationships between them, to what degree the existing theories have been investigated, and to develop new hypotheses to be tested. Often this form is used to help establish a lack of appropriate theories or reveal that current theories are inadequate for explaining new or emerging research problems. The unit of analysis can focus on a theoretical concept or a whole theory or framework.

* Kennedy, Mary M. "Defining a Literature."  Educational Researcher  36 (April 2007): 139-147.

All content in this section is from The Literature Review created by Dr. Robert Larabee USC

Robinson, P. and Lowe, J. (2015),  Literature reviews vs systematic reviews.  Australian and New Zealand Journal of Public Health, 39: 103-103. doi: 10.1111/1753-6405.12393

What's in the name? The difference between a Systematic Review and a Literature Review, and why it matters . By Lynn Kysh from University of Southern California

Systematic review or meta-analysis?

A  systematic review  answers a defined research question by collecting and summarizing all empirical evidence that fits pre-specified eligibility criteria.

A  meta-analysis  is the use of statistical methods to summarize the results of these studies.

Systematic reviews, just like other research articles, can be of varying quality. They are a significant piece of work (the Centre for Reviews and Dissemination at York estimates that a team will take 9-24 months), and to be useful to other researchers and practitioners they should have:

• clearly stated objectives with pre-defined eligibility criteria for studies
• explicit, reproducible methodology
• a systematic search that attempts to identify all studies
• assessment of the validity of the findings of the included studies (e.g. risk of bias)
• systematic presentation, and synthesis, of the characteristics and findings of the included studies

Not all systematic reviews contain meta-analysis. 

Meta-analysis is the use of statistical methods to summarize the results of independent studies. By combining information from all relevant studies, meta-analysis can provide more precise estimates of the effects of health care than those derived from the individual studies included within a review.  More information on meta-analyses can be found in  Cochrane Handbook, Chapter 9 .

A meta-analysis goes beyond critique and integration and conducts secondary statistical analysis on the outcomes of similar studies.  It is a systematic review that uses quantitative methods to synthesize and summarize the results.

An advantage of a meta-analysis is the ability to be completely objective in evaluating research findings.  Not all topics, however, have sufficient research evidence to allow a meta-analysis to be conducted.  In that case, an integrative review is an appropriate strategy. 

Some of the content in this section is from Systematic reviews and meta-analyses: step by step guide created by Kate McAllister.

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• Last Updated: Jul 15, 2024 10:34 AM
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Literature Reviews

What this handout is about.

This handout will explain what literature reviews are and offer insights into the form and construction of literature reviews in the humanities, social sciences, and sciences.

Introduction

OK. You’ve got to write a literature review. You dust off a novel and a book of poetry, settle down in your chair, and get ready to issue a “thumbs up” or “thumbs down” as you leaf through the pages. “Literature review” done. Right?

Wrong! The “literature” of a literature review refers to any collection of materials on a topic, not necessarily the great literary texts of the world. “Literature” could be anything from a set of government pamphlets on British colonial methods in Africa to scholarly articles on the treatment of a torn ACL. And a review does not necessarily mean that your reader wants you to give your personal opinion on whether or not you liked these sources.

What is a literature review, then?

A literature review discusses published information in a particular subject area, and sometimes information in a particular subject area within a certain time period.

A literature review can be just a simple summary of the sources, but it usually has an organizational pattern and combines both summary and synthesis. A summary is a recap of the important information of the source, but a synthesis is a re-organization, or a reshuffling, of that information. It might give a new interpretation of old material or combine new with old interpretations. Or it might trace the intellectual progression of the field, including major debates. And depending on the situation, the literature review may evaluate the sources and advise the reader on the most pertinent or relevant.

But how is a literature review different from an academic research paper?

The main focus of an academic research paper is to develop a new argument, and a research paper is likely to contain a literature review as one of its parts. In a research paper, you use the literature as a foundation and as support for a new insight that you contribute. The focus of a literature review, however, is to summarize and synthesize the arguments and ideas of others without adding new contributions.

Why do we write literature reviews?

Literature reviews provide you with a handy guide to a particular topic. If you have limited time to conduct research, literature reviews can give you an overview or act as a stepping stone. For professionals, they are useful reports that keep them up to date with what is current in the field. For scholars, the depth and breadth of the literature review emphasizes the credibility of the writer in his or her field. Literature reviews also provide a solid background for a research paper’s investigation. Comprehensive knowledge of the literature of the field is essential to most research papers.

Who writes these things, anyway?

Literature reviews are written occasionally in the humanities, but mostly in the sciences and social sciences; in experiment and lab reports, they constitute a section of the paper. Sometimes a literature review is written as a paper in itself.

Let’s get to it! What should I do before writing the literature review?

If your assignment is not very specific, seek clarification from your instructor:

• Roughly how many sources should you include?
• What types of sources (books, journal articles, websites)?
• Should you summarize, synthesize, or critique your sources by discussing a common theme or issue?
• Should you evaluate your sources?
• Should you provide subheadings and other background information, such as definitions and/or a history?

Find models

Look for other literature reviews in your area of interest or in the discipline and read them to get a sense of the types of themes you might want to look for in your own research or ways to organize your final review. You can simply put the word “review” in your search engine along with your other topic terms to find articles of this type on the Internet or in an electronic database. The bibliography or reference section of sources you’ve already read are also excellent entry points into your own research.

Narrow your topic

There are hundreds or even thousands of articles and books on most areas of study. The narrower your topic, the easier it will be to limit the number of sources you need to read in order to get a good survey of the material. Your instructor will probably not expect you to read everything that’s out there on the topic, but you’ll make your job easier if you first limit your scope.

Keep in mind that UNC Libraries have research guides and to databases relevant to many fields of study. You can reach out to the subject librarian for a consultation: https://library.unc.edu/support/consultations/ .

And don’t forget to tap into your professor’s (or other professors’) knowledge in the field. Ask your professor questions such as: “If you had to read only one book from the 90’s on topic X, what would it be?” Questions such as this help you to find and determine quickly the most seminal pieces in the field.

Consider whether your sources are current

Some disciplines require that you use information that is as current as possible. In the sciences, for instance, treatments for medical problems are constantly changing according to the latest studies. Information even two years old could be obsolete. However, if you are writing a review in the humanities, history, or social sciences, a survey of the history of the literature may be what is needed, because what is important is how perspectives have changed through the years or within a certain time period. Try sorting through some other current bibliographies or literature reviews in the field to get a sense of what your discipline expects. You can also use this method to consider what is currently of interest to scholars in this field and what is not.

Strategies for writing the literature review

Find a focus.

A literature review, like a term paper, is usually organized around ideas, not the sources themselves as an annotated bibliography would be organized. This means that you will not just simply list your sources and go into detail about each one of them, one at a time. No. As you read widely but selectively in your topic area, consider instead what themes or issues connect your sources together. Do they present one or different solutions? Is there an aspect of the field that is missing? How well do they present the material and do they portray it according to an appropriate theory? Do they reveal a trend in the field? A raging debate? Pick one of these themes to focus the organization of your review.

Convey it to your reader

A literature review may not have a traditional thesis statement (one that makes an argument), but you do need to tell readers what to expect. Try writing a simple statement that lets the reader know what is your main organizing principle. Here are a couple of examples:

The current trend in treatment for congestive heart failure combines surgery and medicine. More and more cultural studies scholars are accepting popular media as a subject worthy of academic consideration.

Consider organization

You’ve got a focus, and you’ve stated it clearly and directly. Now what is the most effective way of presenting the information? What are the most important topics, subtopics, etc., that your review needs to include? And in what order should you present them? Develop an organization for your review at both a global and local level:

First, cover the basic categories

Just like most academic papers, literature reviews also must contain at least three basic elements: an introduction or background information section; the body of the review containing the discussion of sources; and, finally, a conclusion and/or recommendations section to end the paper. The following provides a brief description of the content of each:

• Introduction: Gives a quick idea of the topic of the literature review, such as the central theme or organizational pattern.
• Body: Contains your discussion of sources and is organized either chronologically, thematically, or methodologically (see below for more information on each).
• Conclusions/Recommendations: Discuss what you have drawn from reviewing literature so far. Where might the discussion proceed?

Organizing the body

Once you have the basic categories in place, then you must consider how you will present the sources themselves within the body of your paper. Create an organizational method to focus this section even further.

To help you come up with an overall organizational framework for your review, consider the following scenario:

You’ve decided to focus your literature review on materials dealing with sperm whales. This is because you’ve just finished reading Moby Dick, and you wonder if that whale’s portrayal is really real. You start with some articles about the physiology of sperm whales in biology journals written in the 1980’s. But these articles refer to some British biological studies performed on whales in the early 18th century. So you check those out. Then you look up a book written in 1968 with information on how sperm whales have been portrayed in other forms of art, such as in Alaskan poetry, in French painting, or on whale bone, as the whale hunters in the late 19th century used to do. This makes you wonder about American whaling methods during the time portrayed in Moby Dick, so you find some academic articles published in the last five years on how accurately Herman Melville portrayed the whaling scene in his novel.

Now consider some typical ways of organizing the sources into a review:

• Chronological: If your review follows the chronological method, you could write about the materials above according to when they were published. For instance, first you would talk about the British biological studies of the 18th century, then about Moby Dick, published in 1851, then the book on sperm whales in other art (1968), and finally the biology articles (1980s) and the recent articles on American whaling of the 19th century. But there is relatively no continuity among subjects here. And notice that even though the sources on sperm whales in other art and on American whaling are written recently, they are about other subjects/objects that were created much earlier. Thus, the review loses its chronological focus.
• By publication: Order your sources by publication chronology, then, only if the order demonstrates a more important trend. For instance, you could order a review of literature on biological studies of sperm whales if the progression revealed a change in dissection practices of the researchers who wrote and/or conducted the studies.
• By trend: A better way to organize the above sources chronologically is to examine the sources under another trend, such as the history of whaling. Then your review would have subsections according to eras within this period. For instance, the review might examine whaling from pre-1600-1699, 1700-1799, and 1800-1899. Under this method, you would combine the recent studies on American whaling in the 19th century with Moby Dick itself in the 1800-1899 category, even though the authors wrote a century apart.
• Thematic: Thematic reviews of literature are organized around a topic or issue, rather than the progression of time. However, progression of time may still be an important factor in a thematic review. For instance, the sperm whale review could focus on the development of the harpoon for whale hunting. While the study focuses on one topic, harpoon technology, it will still be organized chronologically. The only difference here between a “chronological” and a “thematic” approach is what is emphasized the most: the development of the harpoon or the harpoon technology.But more authentic thematic reviews tend to break away from chronological order. For instance, a thematic review of material on sperm whales might examine how they are portrayed as “evil” in cultural documents. The subsections might include how they are personified, how their proportions are exaggerated, and their behaviors misunderstood. A review organized in this manner would shift between time periods within each section according to the point made.
• Methodological: A methodological approach differs from the two above in that the focusing factor usually does not have to do with the content of the material. Instead, it focuses on the “methods” of the researcher or writer. For the sperm whale project, one methodological approach would be to look at cultural differences between the portrayal of whales in American, British, and French art work. Or the review might focus on the economic impact of whaling on a community. A methodological scope will influence either the types of documents in the review or the way in which these documents are discussed. Once you’ve decided on the organizational method for the body of the review, the sections you need to include in the paper should be easy to figure out. They should arise out of your organizational strategy. In other words, a chronological review would have subsections for each vital time period. A thematic review would have subtopics based upon factors that relate to the theme or issue.

Sometimes, though, you might need to add additional sections that are necessary for your study, but do not fit in the organizational strategy of the body. What other sections you include in the body is up to you. Put in only what is necessary. Here are a few other sections you might want to consider:

• Current Situation: Information necessary to understand the topic or focus of the literature review.
• History: The chronological progression of the field, the literature, or an idea that is necessary to understand the literature review, if the body of the literature review is not already a chronology.
• Methods and/or Standards: The criteria you used to select the sources in your literature review or the way in which you present your information. For instance, you might explain that your review includes only peer-reviewed articles and journals.

Questions for Further Research: What questions about the field has the review sparked? How will you further your research as a result of the review?

Begin composing

Once you’ve settled on a general pattern of organization, you’re ready to write each section. There are a few guidelines you should follow during the writing stage as well. Here is a sample paragraph from a literature review about sexism and language to illuminate the following discussion:

However, other studies have shown that even gender-neutral antecedents are more likely to produce masculine images than feminine ones (Gastil, 1990). Hamilton (1988) asked students to complete sentences that required them to fill in pronouns that agreed with gender-neutral antecedents such as “writer,” “pedestrian,” and “persons.” The students were asked to describe any image they had when writing the sentence. Hamilton found that people imagined 3.3 men to each woman in the masculine “generic” condition and 1.5 men per woman in the unbiased condition. Thus, while ambient sexism accounted for some of the masculine bias, sexist language amplified the effect. (Source: Erika Falk and Jordan Mills, “Why Sexist Language Affects Persuasion: The Role of Homophily, Intended Audience, and Offense,” Women and Language19:2).

Use evidence

In the example above, the writers refer to several other sources when making their point. A literature review in this sense is just like any other academic research paper. Your interpretation of the available sources must be backed up with evidence to show that what you are saying is valid.

Be selective

Select only the most important points in each source to highlight in the review. The type of information you choose to mention should relate directly to the review’s focus, whether it is thematic, methodological, or chronological.

Use quotes sparingly

Falk and Mills do not use any direct quotes. That is because the survey nature of the literature review does not allow for in-depth discussion or detailed quotes from the text. Some short quotes here and there are okay, though, if you want to emphasize a point, or if what the author said just cannot be rewritten in your own words. Notice that Falk and Mills do quote certain terms that were coined by the author, not common knowledge, or taken directly from the study. But if you find yourself wanting to put in more quotes, check with your instructor.

Summarize and synthesize

Remember to summarize and synthesize your sources within each paragraph as well as throughout the review. The authors here recapitulate important features of Hamilton’s study, but then synthesize it by rephrasing the study’s significance and relating it to their own work.

Keep your own voice

While the literature review presents others’ ideas, your voice (the writer’s) should remain front and center. Notice that Falk and Mills weave references to other sources into their own text, but they still maintain their own voice by starting and ending the paragraph with their own ideas and their own words. The sources support what Falk and Mills are saying.

Use caution when paraphrasing

When paraphrasing a source that is not your own, be sure to represent the author’s information or opinions accurately and in your own words. In the preceding example, Falk and Mills either directly refer in the text to the author of their source, such as Hamilton, or they provide ample notation in the text when the ideas they are mentioning are not their own, for example, Gastil’s. For more information, please see our handout on plagiarism .

Revise, revise, revise

Draft in hand? Now you’re ready to revise. Spending a lot of time revising is a wise idea, because your main objective is to present the material, not the argument. So check over your review again to make sure it follows the assignment and/or your outline. Then, just as you would for most other academic forms of writing, rewrite or rework the language of your review so that you’ve presented your information in the most concise manner possible. Be sure to use terminology familiar to your audience; get rid of unnecessary jargon or slang. Finally, double check that you’ve documented your sources and formatted the review appropriately for your discipline. For tips on the revising and editing process, see our handout on revising drafts .

Works consulted

We consulted these works while writing this handout. This is not a comprehensive list of resources on the handout’s topic, and we encourage you to do your own research to find additional publications. Please do not use this list as a model for the format of your own reference list, as it may not match the citation style you are using. For guidance on formatting citations, please see the UNC Libraries citation tutorial . We revise these tips periodically and welcome feedback.

Anson, Chris M., and Robert A. Schwegler. 2010. The Longman Handbook for Writers and Readers , 6th ed. New York: Longman.

Jones, Robert, Patrick Bizzaro, and Cynthia Selfe. 1997. The Harcourt Brace Guide to Writing in the Disciplines . New York: Harcourt Brace.

Lamb, Sandra E. 1998. How to Write It: A Complete Guide to Everything You’ll Ever Write . Berkeley: Ten Speed Press.

Rosen, Leonard J., and Laurence Behrens. 2003. The Allyn & Bacon Handbook , 5th ed. New York: Longman.

Troyka, Lynn Quittman, and Doug Hesse. 2016. Simon and Schuster Handbook for Writers , 11th ed. London: Pearson.

You may reproduce it for non-commercial use if you use the entire handout and attribute the source: The Writing Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

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Ten Simple Rules for Writing a Literature Review

Marco pautasso.

1 Centre for Functional and Evolutionary Ecology (CEFE), CNRS, Montpellier, France

2 Centre for Biodiversity Synthesis and Analysis (CESAB), FRB, Aix-en-Provence, France

Literature reviews are in great demand in most scientific fields. Their need stems from the ever-increasing output of scientific publications [1] . For example, compared to 1991, in 2008 three, eight, and forty times more papers were indexed in Web of Science on malaria, obesity, and biodiversity, respectively [2] . Given such mountains of papers, scientists cannot be expected to examine in detail every single new paper relevant to their interests [3] . Thus, it is both advantageous and necessary to rely on regular summaries of the recent literature. Although recognition for scientists mainly comes from primary research, timely literature reviews can lead to new synthetic insights and are often widely read [4] . For such summaries to be useful, however, they need to be compiled in a professional way [5] .

When starting from scratch, reviewing the literature can require a titanic amount of work. That is why researchers who have spent their career working on a certain research issue are in a perfect position to review that literature. Some graduate schools are now offering courses in reviewing the literature, given that most research students start their project by producing an overview of what has already been done on their research issue [6] . However, it is likely that most scientists have not thought in detail about how to approach and carry out a literature review.

Reviewing the literature requires the ability to juggle multiple tasks, from finding and evaluating relevant material to synthesising information from various sources, from critical thinking to paraphrasing, evaluating, and citation skills [7] . In this contribution, I share ten simple rules I learned working on about 25 literature reviews as a PhD and postdoctoral student. Ideas and insights also come from discussions with coauthors and colleagues, as well as feedback from reviewers and editors.

Rule 1: Define a Topic and Audience

How to choose which topic to review? There are so many issues in contemporary science that you could spend a lifetime of attending conferences and reading the literature just pondering what to review. On the one hand, if you take several years to choose, several other people may have had the same idea in the meantime. On the other hand, only a well-considered topic is likely to lead to a brilliant literature review [8] . The topic must at least be:

• interesting to you (ideally, you should have come across a series of recent papers related to your line of work that call for a critical summary),
• an important aspect of the field (so that many readers will be interested in the review and there will be enough material to write it), and
• a well-defined issue (otherwise you could potentially include thousands of publications, which would make the review unhelpful).

Ideas for potential reviews may come from papers providing lists of key research questions to be answered [9] , but also from serendipitous moments during desultory reading and discussions. In addition to choosing your topic, you should also select a target audience. In many cases, the topic (e.g., web services in computational biology) will automatically define an audience (e.g., computational biologists), but that same topic may also be of interest to neighbouring fields (e.g., computer science, biology, etc.).

Rule 2: Search and Re-search the Literature

After having chosen your topic and audience, start by checking the literature and downloading relevant papers. Five pieces of advice here:

• keep track of the search items you use (so that your search can be replicated [10] ),
• keep a list of papers whose pdfs you cannot access immediately (so as to retrieve them later with alternative strategies),
• use a paper management system (e.g., Mendeley, Papers, Qiqqa, Sente),
• define early in the process some criteria for exclusion of irrelevant papers (these criteria can then be described in the review to help define its scope), and
• do not just look for research papers in the area you wish to review, but also seek previous reviews.

The chances are high that someone will already have published a literature review ( Figure 1 ), if not exactly on the issue you are planning to tackle, at least on a related topic. If there are already a few or several reviews of the literature on your issue, my advice is not to give up, but to carry on with your own literature review,

The bottom-right situation (many literature reviews but few research papers) is not just a theoretical situation; it applies, for example, to the study of the impacts of climate change on plant diseases, where there appear to be more literature reviews than research studies [33] .

• discussing in your review the approaches, limitations, and conclusions of past reviews,
• trying to find a new angle that has not been covered adequately in the previous reviews, and
• incorporating new material that has inevitably accumulated since their appearance.

When searching the literature for pertinent papers and reviews, the usual rules apply:

• be thorough,
• use different keywords and database sources (e.g., DBLP, Google Scholar, ISI Proceedings, JSTOR Search, Medline, Scopus, Web of Science), and
• look at who has cited past relevant papers and book chapters.

Rule 3: Take Notes While Reading

If you read the papers first, and only afterwards start writing the review, you will need a very good memory to remember who wrote what, and what your impressions and associations were while reading each single paper. My advice is, while reading, to start writing down interesting pieces of information, insights about how to organize the review, and thoughts on what to write. This way, by the time you have read the literature you selected, you will already have a rough draft of the review.

Of course, this draft will still need much rewriting, restructuring, and rethinking to obtain a text with a coherent argument [11] , but you will have avoided the danger posed by staring at a blank document. Be careful when taking notes to use quotation marks if you are provisionally copying verbatim from the literature. It is advisable then to reformulate such quotes with your own words in the final draft. It is important to be careful in noting the references already at this stage, so as to avoid misattributions. Using referencing software from the very beginning of your endeavour will save you time.

Rule 4: Choose the Type of Review You Wish to Write

After having taken notes while reading the literature, you will have a rough idea of the amount of material available for the review. This is probably a good time to decide whether to go for a mini- or a full review. Some journals are now favouring the publication of rather short reviews focusing on the last few years, with a limit on the number of words and citations. A mini-review is not necessarily a minor review: it may well attract more attention from busy readers, although it will inevitably simplify some issues and leave out some relevant material due to space limitations. A full review will have the advantage of more freedom to cover in detail the complexities of a particular scientific development, but may then be left in the pile of the very important papers “to be read” by readers with little time to spare for major monographs.

There is probably a continuum between mini- and full reviews. The same point applies to the dichotomy of descriptive vs. integrative reviews. While descriptive reviews focus on the methodology, findings, and interpretation of each reviewed study, integrative reviews attempt to find common ideas and concepts from the reviewed material [12] . A similar distinction exists between narrative and systematic reviews: while narrative reviews are qualitative, systematic reviews attempt to test a hypothesis based on the published evidence, which is gathered using a predefined protocol to reduce bias [13] , [14] . When systematic reviews analyse quantitative results in a quantitative way, they become meta-analyses. The choice between different review types will have to be made on a case-by-case basis, depending not just on the nature of the material found and the preferences of the target journal(s), but also on the time available to write the review and the number of coauthors [15] .

Rule 5: Keep the Review Focused, but Make It of Broad Interest

Whether your plan is to write a mini- or a full review, it is good advice to keep it focused 16 , 17 . Including material just for the sake of it can easily lead to reviews that are trying to do too many things at once. The need to keep a review focused can be problematic for interdisciplinary reviews, where the aim is to bridge the gap between fields [18] . If you are writing a review on, for example, how epidemiological approaches are used in modelling the spread of ideas, you may be inclined to include material from both parent fields, epidemiology and the study of cultural diffusion. This may be necessary to some extent, but in this case a focused review would only deal in detail with those studies at the interface between epidemiology and the spread of ideas.

While focus is an important feature of a successful review, this requirement has to be balanced with the need to make the review relevant to a broad audience. This square may be circled by discussing the wider implications of the reviewed topic for other disciplines.

Rule 6: Be Critical and Consistent

Reviewing the literature is not stamp collecting. A good review does not just summarize the literature, but discusses it critically, identifies methodological problems, and points out research gaps [19] . After having read a review of the literature, a reader should have a rough idea of:

• the major achievements in the reviewed field,
• the main areas of debate, and
• the outstanding research questions.

It is challenging to achieve a successful review on all these fronts. A solution can be to involve a set of complementary coauthors: some people are excellent at mapping what has been achieved, some others are very good at identifying dark clouds on the horizon, and some have instead a knack at predicting where solutions are going to come from. If your journal club has exactly this sort of team, then you should definitely write a review of the literature! In addition to critical thinking, a literature review needs consistency, for example in the choice of passive vs. active voice and present vs. past tense.

Rule 7: Find a Logical Structure

Like a well-baked cake, a good review has a number of telling features: it is worth the reader's time, timely, systematic, well written, focused, and critical. It also needs a good structure. With reviews, the usual subdivision of research papers into introduction, methods, results, and discussion does not work or is rarely used. However, a general introduction of the context and, toward the end, a recapitulation of the main points covered and take-home messages make sense also in the case of reviews. For systematic reviews, there is a trend towards including information about how the literature was searched (database, keywords, time limits) [20] .

How can you organize the flow of the main body of the review so that the reader will be drawn into and guided through it? It is generally helpful to draw a conceptual scheme of the review, e.g., with mind-mapping techniques. Such diagrams can help recognize a logical way to order and link the various sections of a review [21] . This is the case not just at the writing stage, but also for readers if the diagram is included in the review as a figure. A careful selection of diagrams and figures relevant to the reviewed topic can be very helpful to structure the text too [22] .

Rule 8: Make Use of Feedback

Reviews of the literature are normally peer-reviewed in the same way as research papers, and rightly so [23] . As a rule, incorporating feedback from reviewers greatly helps improve a review draft. Having read the review with a fresh mind, reviewers may spot inaccuracies, inconsistencies, and ambiguities that had not been noticed by the writers due to rereading the typescript too many times. It is however advisable to reread the draft one more time before submission, as a last-minute correction of typos, leaps, and muddled sentences may enable the reviewers to focus on providing advice on the content rather than the form.

Feedback is vital to writing a good review, and should be sought from a variety of colleagues, so as to obtain a diversity of views on the draft. This may lead in some cases to conflicting views on the merits of the paper, and on how to improve it, but such a situation is better than the absence of feedback. A diversity of feedback perspectives on a literature review can help identify where the consensus view stands in the landscape of the current scientific understanding of an issue [24] .

Rule 9: Include Your Own Relevant Research, but Be Objective

In many cases, reviewers of the literature will have published studies relevant to the review they are writing. This could create a conflict of interest: how can reviewers report objectively on their own work [25] ? Some scientists may be overly enthusiastic about what they have published, and thus risk giving too much importance to their own findings in the review. However, bias could also occur in the other direction: some scientists may be unduly dismissive of their own achievements, so that they will tend to downplay their contribution (if any) to a field when reviewing it.

In general, a review of the literature should neither be a public relations brochure nor an exercise in competitive self-denial. If a reviewer is up to the job of producing a well-organized and methodical review, which flows well and provides a service to the readership, then it should be possible to be objective in reviewing one's own relevant findings. In reviews written by multiple authors, this may be achieved by assigning the review of the results of a coauthor to different coauthors.

Rule 10: Be Up-to-Date, but Do Not Forget Older Studies

Given the progressive acceleration in the publication of scientific papers, today's reviews of the literature need awareness not just of the overall direction and achievements of a field of inquiry, but also of the latest studies, so as not to become out-of-date before they have been published. Ideally, a literature review should not identify as a major research gap an issue that has just been addressed in a series of papers in press (the same applies, of course, to older, overlooked studies (“sleeping beauties” [26] )). This implies that literature reviewers would do well to keep an eye on electronic lists of papers in press, given that it can take months before these appear in scientific databases. Some reviews declare that they have scanned the literature up to a certain point in time, but given that peer review can be a rather lengthy process, a full search for newly appeared literature at the revision stage may be worthwhile. Assessing the contribution of papers that have just appeared is particularly challenging, because there is little perspective with which to gauge their significance and impact on further research and society.

Inevitably, new papers on the reviewed topic (including independently written literature reviews) will appear from all quarters after the review has been published, so that there may soon be the need for an updated review. But this is the nature of science [27] – [32] . I wish everybody good luck with writing a review of the literature.

Acknowledgments

Many thanks to M. Barbosa, K. Dehnen-Schmutz, T. Döring, D. Fontaneto, M. Garbelotto, O. Holdenrieder, M. Jeger, D. Lonsdale, A. MacLeod, P. Mills, M. Moslonka-Lefebvre, G. Stancanelli, P. Weisberg, and X. Xu for insights and discussions, and to P. Bourne, T. Matoni, and D. Smith for helpful comments on a previous draft.

Funding Statement

This work was funded by the French Foundation for Research on Biodiversity (FRB) through its Centre for Synthesis and Analysis of Biodiversity data (CESAB), as part of the NETSEED research project. The funders had no role in the preparation of the manuscript.

Educational resources and simple solutions for your research journey

Differences Between Literature Search and Literature Review

Differences between literature search and literature review

You’ve just found out you need to do a literature review. You know the term literature search, but you’re not sure what the difference is between a literature search and a literature review. This can be confusing if you’re just starting out in academia. Although literature search and review are related terms, they refer to different processes and functions. In general, a literature search is the process of seeking out and identifying the existing literature related to a topic or question of interest, while a literature review is the organized synthesis of the information found in the existing literature.

In research applications, a literature search is typically the first step of a literature review. The search identifies relevant existing studies and articles, and the review is the end result of analyzing, synthesizing, and organizing the information found in the search. The following summarizes the literature search and review concepts as researchers typically practice them.

Literature search

A literature search is a systematic search for existing information on your question or topic 1 . The purpose of a literature search is to aid in the formulation of a research question and study design. When you are planning to conduct a study on a specific topic, the literature search helps narrow the focus of your study by identifying areas in which knowledge gaps exist. The search of existing studies can also guide the research design by suggesting appropriate methodologies and important variables. Research studies are never done in a vacuum – they are built on previous knowledge. A comprehensive literature search and review will provide you the base on which to build your study.

An effective search needs to be planned. Here are some tips for conducting a literature search 4 .

• Identify key words to use when searching through library and internet resources.
• Search multiple databases for relevant articles, books, and other scholarly writings.
• Use articles similar to your proposed study to find additional keywords.
• Start with the most recent articles and work backward in time if necessary.
• Include conference papers in your search as they generally represent the latest research.
• Cast a wide net by searching in databases that might be unrelated to your topic.
• Keep in mind that literature searches are iterative processes. Find new key words and articles through the references and citations in other relevant sources.
• Make sure to document all of the articles you identify as relevant to your topic. This will save you time and frustration later when you want to find them again and when you need to write references for your literature review.

In a literature review, the results of a literature search are used to produce an organized and coherent presentation of the relevant knowledge about a specific topic. This is accomplished through reviewing, evaluating, analyzing, and synthesizing the information found through a search. An effective literature review clearly places the proposed study in the context of previous research studies and identifies a gap in the knowledge that will be addressed by the proposed study.

A good literature review serves to demonstrate the depth of your knowledge and understanding of the topic; it is not simply a summary or description of those studies 2 . Here are some tips in conducting an effective literature review process.

• Identify a wide range of articles using a literature search.
• Evaluate those articles to determine which are relevant to your review 2 . When evaluating the research, include considerations such as the significance of the study, the methodology, the value of the analysis, the structure of the article, and the overall effectiveness of the study.
• Analyze the articles you’ve chosen to include. Critically and objectively review the study’s methods, results, and conclusions. Look for strengths and weaknesses. What can you learn from this study as it relates to your work?
• Synthesize the information from all of the included sources. Look for patterns in the articles. What do they agree on? What do they disagree on? What is missing from the information?
• Organize your literature review based on chronology, methodology, or themes. Again, this should not be merely a listing of the literature but a carefully structured whole.
• Write your literature review using the format of an introduction, body, and conclusion.

Additional tips for researchers

• Always strive for objectivity when conducting a literature search or review. Include all viewpoints and do not begin the process expecting a specific result. Avoid opinions.
• Make sure your selected sources and your literature review work to place your study in the context of the existing literature.
• The literature should reveal a knowledge gap that will be addressed by your study.
• As with all writing, keep your audience in mind.

Table of Contents

• Grewal A, Kataria H, Dhawan I. Literature search for research planning and identification of research problem. Indian J Anaesth. 2016, 60, 635-639. doi: 10.4103/0019-5049.190618.
• Niagara University Library Research Guide. Literature Review. https://niagara.libguides.com/litreview/sixsteps [Accessed August 31, 2022]

R Discovery is a literature search and research reading platform that accelerates your research discovery journey by keeping you updated on the latest, most relevant scholarly content. With 250M+ research articles sourced from trusted aggregators like CrossRef, Unpaywall, PubMed, PubMed Central, Open Alex and top publishing houses like Springer Nature, JAMA, IOP, Taylor & Francis, NEJM, BMJ, Karger, SAGE, Emerald Publishing and more, R Discovery puts a world of research at your fingertips.  

Try R Discovery Prime FREE for 1 week or upgrade at just US$72 a year to access premium features that let you listen to research on the go, read in your language, collaborate with peers, auto sync with reference managers, and much more. Choose a simpler, smarter way to find and read research – Download the app and start your free 7-day trial today !  

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• Library Guide: Literature Review

Introduction to Literature Review

If you cannot access the above video, you can watch it here

What is a Literature Review

  The purpose of an academic research paper is to express and document an original idea. Literature Review is one part of that process of writing a research paper. In a research paper, you use the literature as a starting point, a building block and as evidence of a new insight. The goal of the literature review is only to summarize and synthesize the arguments and ideas of others. You should not present your original idea.

The reading that you do as part of a literature review will answer one of two questions:

“What do we know about the subject of our study?” “Based on what we know, what conclusions can we draw about the research question?”

Notice that the conclusions to be drawn are about the research question , as opposed to a novel theory. 

The types of conclusions about your research question that you want to discover are: ❖ gaps in the knowledge on a subject area ❖ questions about your topic that remain unanswered ❖ areas of disagreement in your subject area that need to be settled.

Purpose of Literature Review?

There are a number of differing descriptions of the purpose of a literature review. Primarily it is a tool for

❖ researching the history of scholarly publication on a topic

❖ becoming aware of the scholarly debate within a topic

❖  a summary or restatement of conclusions from research which has been published

❖ synthesis or recombining, comparing and contrasting, the ideas of others.

❖ evaluate sources

❖ search for gaps

A literature review provides a comprehensive overview of a topic , supporting the fundamental purpose of a research paper, which is to present a new point of view or insight on a topic. The literature review supports the new insight. It does not present or argue for it.

Structure of Literature Review

• Choose a topic
• Find research
• Organize sources/notetaking
• Evaluate Sources
• Synthesize: think of this phase as a narrative . 

There are various ways of organizing the literature review process- if one of these seems closer to your purpose, try it out.

Different Types of Literature Sources

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CC0006 Basics of Report Writing

Structure of a report (case study, literature review or survey).

• Structure of report (Site visit)
• Citing Sources
• Tips and Resources

The information in the report has to be organised in the best possible way for the reader to understand the issue being investigated, analysis of the findings and recommendations or implications that relate directly to the findings. Given below are the main sections of a standard report. Click on each section heading to learn more about it.

• Tells the reader what the report is about
• Informative, short, catchy

Example - Sea level rise in Singapore : Causes, Impact and Solution

The title page must also include group name, group members and their matriculation numbers.

Contents Page

• Has headings and subheadings that show the reader where the various sections of the report are located
• Written on a separate page
• Includes the page numbers of each section
• Briefly summarises the report, the process of research and final conclusions
• Provides a quick overview of the report and describes the main highlights
• Short, usually not more than 150 words in length
• Mention briefly why you choose this project, what are the implications and what kind of problems it will solve

The abstract allow readers who may be interested in the report to decide whether it is relevant to their purposes. Usually, the abstract is written last, ie. after writing the other sections and you know the key points to draw out from these sections.

Introduction

• Discusses the background and sets the context
• Introduces the topic, significance of the problem, and the purpose of research
• Gives the scope ie shows what it includes and excludes

In the introduction, write about what motivates your project, what makes it interesting, what questions do you aim to answer by doing your project. The introduction lays the foundation for understanding the research problem and should be written in a way that leads the reader from the general subject area of the topic to the particular topic of research.

Literature Review

• Helps to gain an understanding of the existing research in that topic
• To develop on your own ideas and build your ideas based on the existing knowledge
• Prevents duplication of the research done by others

Search the existing literature for information. Identify the data pertinent to your topic. Review, extract the relevant information for eg how the study was conducted and the findings. Summarise the information. Write what is already known about the topic and what do the sources that you have reviewed say. Identify conflicts in previous studies, open questions, or gaps that may exist. If you are doing

• Case study - look for background information and if any similar case studies have been done before.
• Literature review - find out from literature, what is the background to the questions that you are looking into
• Site visit - use the literature review to read up and prepare good questions before hand.
• Survey - find out if similar surveys have been done before and what did they find?

Keep a record of the source details of any information you want to use in your report so that you can reference them accurately.

Methodology

Methodology is the approach that you take to gather data and arrive at the recommendation(s). Choose a method that is appropriate for the research topic and explain it in detail.

In this section, address the following: a) How the data was collected b) How it was analysed and c) Explain or justify why a particular method was chosen.

Usually, the methodology is written in the past tense and can be in the passive voice. Some examples of the different methods that you can use to gather data are given below. The data collected provides evidence to build your arguments. Collect data, integrate the findings and perspectives from different studies and add your own analysis of its feasibility.

For CC0006 Group Project, use one of the four methods listed below:

• Explore the literature/news/internet sources to know the topic in depth
• Give a description of how you selected the literature for your project
• Compare the studies, and highlight the findings, gaps or limitations.
• An in-depth, detailed examination of specific cases within a real-world context.
• Enables you to examine the data within a specific context.
• Examine a well defined case to identify the essential factors, process and relationship.
• Write the case description, the context and the process involved.
• Make sense of the evidence in the case(s) to answer the research question
• Gather data from a predefined group of respondents by asking relevant questions
• Can be conducted in person or online
• Why you chose this method (questionnaires, focus group, experimental procedure, etc)
• How you carried out the survey. Include techniques and any equipment you used
• If there were participants in your research, who were they? How did you select them and how may were there?
• How the survey questions address the different aspects of the research question
• Analyse the technology / policy approaches by visiting the required site(s)
• Make a detailed report on its features and your understanding of it

Results and Analysis

• Present the results of the study. You may consider visualising the results in tables and graphs, graphics etc.
• Analyse the results to obtain answer to the research question.
• Provide an analysis of the technical and financial feasibility, social acceptability, etc.

Discussion, Limitation(s) and Implication(s)

• Discuss your interpretations of the analysis and the significance of your findings
• Explain any new understanding or insights that emerged as a result of your research
• Consider the different perspectives (social, economic and environmental)in the discussion
• Explain the limitation(s)
• Explain how could what you found be used to make a difference for sustainability

Conclusion and Recommendations

• Summarise the significance and outcome of the study highlighting the key points.
• Come up with alternatives and propose specific actions based on the alternatives
• Describe the result or improvement it would achieve
• Explain how it will be implemented

Recommendations should have an innovative approach and should be feasible. It should make a significant difference in solving the issue under discussion.

• List all sources that you have referred to in your writing.
• Use the recommended citation style consistently in your report.

Appendix (if necessary/any)

Include any material relating to the report and research that does not fit in the body of the report in the appendix. For example, you may include the survey questionnaire and detailed results in the appendix.

Start each appendix on a separate page and label sequentially using numbers or letters, eg. Appendix 1, Appendix 2, etc.

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Researching and writing for Economics students

4 literature review and citations/references.

Figure 4.1: Literature reviews and references

Your may have done a literature survey as part of your proposal. This will be incorporated into your dissertation, not left as separate stand-alone. Most economics papers include a literature review section, which may be a separate section, or incorporated into the paper’s introduction. (See organising for a standard format.)

Some disambiguation:

A ‘Literature survey’ paper: Some academic papers are called ‘literature surveys’. These try to summarise and discuss the existing work that has been done on a particular topic, and can be very useful. See, for example, works in The Journal of Economic Perspectives, the Journal of Economic Literature, the “Handbook of [XXX] Economics”

Many student projects and undergraduate dissertations are mainly literature surveys.

4.1 What is the point of a literature survey?

Your literature review should explain:

what has been done already to address your topic and related questions, putting your work in perspective, and

what techniques others have used, what are their strengths and weaknesses, and how might they be relevant tools for your own analysis.

Figure 4.2: Take notes on this as you read, and write them up.

4.2 What previous work is relevant?

Focus on literature that is relevant to your topic only.

But do not focus only on articles about your exact topic ! For example, if your paper is about the relative price of cars in the UK, you might cite papers (i) about the global automobile market, (ii) about the theory and evidence on competition in markets with similar features and (iii) using econometric techniques such as “hedonic regression” to estimate “price premia” in other markets and in other countries.

Consider: If you were Colchester a doctor and wanted to know whether a medicine would be effective for your patients, would you only consider medical studies that ran tests on Colchester residents, or would you consider more general national and international investigations?

4.3 What are “good” economics journal articles?

You should aim to read and cite peer-reviewed articles in reputable economics journals. (Journals in other fields such as Finance, Marketing and Political Science may also be useful.) These papers have a certain credibility as they have been checked by several referees and one or more editors before being published. (In fact, the publication process in Economics is extremely lengthy and difficult.)

Which journals are “reputable”? Economists spend a lot of time thinking about how to rank and compare journals (there are so many papers written about this topic that they someone could start a “Journal of Ranking Economics Journals”. For example, “ REPEC ” has one ranking, and SCIMAGO/SCOPUS has another one. You may want to focus on journals ranked in the top 100 or top 200 of these rankings. If you find it very interesting and relevant paper published somewhere that is ranked below this, is okay to cite it, but you may want to be a bit more skeptical of its findings.

Any journal you find on JSTOR is respectable, and if you look in the back of your textbooks, there will be references to articles in journals, most of which are decent.

You may also find unpublished “working papers”; these may also be useful as references. However, it is more difficult to evaluate the credibility of these, as they have not been through a process of peer review. However, if the author has published well and has a good reputation, it might be more likely that these are worth reading and citing.

Unpublished “working papers”

You may also find unpublished “working papers” or ‘mimeos’; these may also be useful as references. In fact, the publication process in Economics is so slow (six years from first working paper to publication is not uncommon) that not consulting working papers often means not being current.

However, it is more difficult to evaluate the credibility of this ‘grey literature’, as they have not been through a process of peer review. However, if the author has published well and has a good reputation, it might be more likely that these are worth reading and citing. Some working paper series are vetted, such as NBER; in terms of credibility, these might be seen as something in between a working paper and a publication.

Which of the following are “peer-reviewed articles in reputable economics journals”? Which of the following may be appropriate to cite in your literature review and in your final project? 8

Klein, G, J. (2011) “Cartel Destabilization and Leniency Programs – Empirical Evidence.” ZEW - Centre for European Economic Research Discussion Paper No. 10-107

Spencer, B. and Brander, J.A. (1983) “International R&D Rivalry and Industrial Strategy”, Review of Economic Studies Vol. 50, 707-722

Troisi, Jordan D., Andrew N. Christopher, and Pam Marek. “Materialism and money spending disposition as predictors of economic and personality variables.” North American Journal of Psychology 8.3 (2006): 421.

The Economist,. ‘Good, Bad And Ugly’. Web. 11 Apr. 2015. [accessed on…]

Mecaj, Arjola, and María Isabel González Bravo. “CSR Actions and Financial Distress: Do Firms Change Their CSR Behavior When Signals of Financial Distress Are Identified?.” Modern Economy 2014 (2014).

Universities, U. K. “Creating Prosperity: the role of higher education in driving the UK’s creative economy.” London Universities UK (2010).

4.4 How to find and access articles

You should be able to find and access all the relevant articles online. Leafing through bound volumes and photocopying should not be neededs. (Having been a student in the late 90’s and 2000’s, I wish I could get those hours back.)

Figure 4.3: The old way!

Good online tools include Jstor (jstor.org) and Google Scholar (scholar.google.co.uk). Your university should have access to Jstor, and Google is accessible to all (although the linked articles may require special access). You will usually have the ‘most access’ when logged into your university or library computing system.If you cannot access a paper, you may want to consult a reference librarian.

It is also ok, if you cannot access the journal article itself, to use the last working paper version (on Google scholar find this in the tab that says “all X versions”, where X is some number, and look for a PDF). However, authors do not always put up the most polished versions, although they should do to promote open-access. As a very last resort, you can e-mail the author and ask him or her to send you the paper.

When looking for references, try to find ones published in respected refereed economics journals (see above ).

4.5 Good starting points: Survey article, course notes, and textbooks

A “survey article” is a good place to start; this is a paper that is largely a categorization and discussion of previous work on a particular topic. You can often find such papers in journals such as

• the Journal of Economic Perspectives,
• the Journal of Economic Surveys,
• and the Journal of Economic Literature.

These will be useful as a “catalog” of papers to read and considers citing. They are also typically very readable and offer a decent introduction to the issue or the field.

It is also helpful to consult module (course) notes and syllabi from the relevant field. Do not only limit yourself to the ones at your own university; many of universities make their course materials publicly accessible online. These will not only typically contain reading lists with well-respected and useful references, they may also contain slides and other material that will help you better understand your topic and the relevant issues.

However, be careful not to take material from course notes without properly citing it. (Better yet, try to find the original paper that the course notes are referring to.)

Textbooks serve as another extremely useful jumping off point. Look through your own textbooks and other textbooks in the right fields. Textbooks draw from, and cite a range of relevant articles and papers. (You may also want to go back to textbooks when you are finding the articles you are reading too difficult. Textbooks may present a simpler version of the material presented in an article, and explain the concepts better.)

4.6 Backwards and forwards with references

When you find a useful paper, look for its “family.” You may want to go back to earlier, more fundamental references, by looking at the articles that this paper cited. See what is listed as “keywords” (these are usually given at the top of the paper), and “JEL codes”. Check what papers this paper cites, and check what other papers cited this paper. On Google scholar you can follow this with a link “Cited by…” below the listed article. “Related articles” is also a useful link.

4.7 Citations

Keep track of all references and citations

You may find it helpful to use software to help you manage your citations

A storage “database” of citations (e.g., Jabref, Zotero, Endnote, Mendeley); these interface well with Google Scholar and Jstor

An automatic “insert citation” and “insert bibliography” in your word processing software

Use a tool like Endnote to manage and insert the bibliographies, or use a bibliography manager software such as Zotero or Jabref,

Further discussion: Citation management tools

List of works cited

Put your list of references in alphabetical order by author’s last name (surname).

Include all articles and works that you cite in your paper; do not include any that you don’t cite.

Avoiding plagiarism and academic offenses**

Here is a definition of plagiarism

The main point is that you need to cite everything that is not your own work. Furthermore, be clear to distinguish what is your own work and your own language and what is from somewhere/someone else.

Why cite? Not just to give credit to others but to make it clear that the remaining uncited content is your own.

Here are some basic rules:

(Rephrased from University of Essex material, as seen in Department of Economics, EC100 Economics for Business Handbook 2017-18, https://www1.essex.ac.uk/economics/documents/EC100-Booklet_2017.pdf accessed on 20 July 2019, pp. 15-16)

Do not submit anything that is not your own work.

Never copy from friends.

Do not copy your own work or previously submitted work. (Caveat: If you are submitting a draft or a ‘literature review and project plan’ at an earlier stage, this can be incorporated into your final submission.

Don’t copy text directly into your work, unless:

• you put all passages in quotation marks: beginning with ’ and ending with ’, or clearly offset from the main text
• you cite the source of this text.

It is not sufficient merely to add a citation for the source of copied material following the copied material (typically the end of a paragraph). You must include the copied material in quotation marks. … Ignorance … is no defence.’ (ibid, pp. 15 )

(‘Ibid’ means ‘same as the previous citation’.)

Your university may use sophisticated plagiarism-detection software. Markers may also report if the paper looks suspect

Before final submission, they may ask you to go over your draft and sign that you understand the contents and you have demonstrated that the work is your own.

Not being in touch with your supervisor may put you under suspicion.

Your university may give a Viva Voce oral exam if your work is under suspicion. It is a cool-sounding word but probably something you want to avoid.

Your university may store your work in its our database, and can pursue disciplinary action, even after you have graduated.

Penalties may be severe, including failure with no opportunity to retake the module (course). You may even risk your degree!

Comprehension questions; answers in footnotes

True or false: “If you do not directly quote a paper you do not need to cite it” 9

You should read and cite a paper (choose all that are correct)… 10

• If it motivates ‘why your question is interesting’ and how it can be modeled economically
• Only if it asks the same question as your paper
• Only if it is dealing with the same country/industry/etc as you are addressing
• If it has any connection to your topic, question, or related matters
• If it answers a similar question as your paper
• If it uses and discusses techniques that inform those you are using

4.8 How to write about previous authors’ analysis and findings

Use the right terminology.

“Johnson et al. (2000) provide an analytical framework that sheds substantial doubt on that belief. When trying to obtain a correlation between institutional efficiency and wealth per capita, they are left with largely inconclusive results.”

They are not trying to “obtain a correlation”; they are trying to measure the relationship and test hypotheses.

“Findings”: Critically examine sources

Don’t take everything that is in print (or written online) as gospel truth. Be skeptical and carefully evaluate the arguments and evidence presented. Try to really survey what has been written, to consider the range of opinions and the preponderance of the evidence. You also need to be careful to distinguish between “real research” and propaganda or press releases.

The returns to higher education in Atlantis are extremely high. For the majority of Atlanian students a university degree has increased their lifetime income by over 50%, as reported in the “Benefits of Higher Education” report put out by the Association of Atlantian Universities (2016).

But don’t be harsh without explanation:

Smith (2014) found a return to education in Atlantis exceeding 50%. This result is unlikely to be true because the study was not a very good one.

“Findings:” “They Proved”

A theoretical economic model can not really prove anything about the real world; they typically rely on strong simplifying assumptions.

Through their economic model, they prove that as long as elites have incentives to invest in de facto power, through lobbying or corruption for example, they will invest as much as possible in order to gain favourable conditions in the future for their businesses.

In their two period model, which assumes \[details of key assumptions here\] , they find that when an elite Agent has an incentive to invest in de facto power, he invests a strictly positive amount, up to the point where marginal benefit equals marginal cost”

Empirical work does not “prove” anything (nor does it claim to).

It relies on statistical inference under specific assumptions, and an intuitive sense that evidence from one situation is likely to apply to other situations.

“As Smith et al (1999) proved using data from the 1910-1920 Scandanavian stock exchange, equity prices always increase in response to reductions in corporate tax rates.”

“Smith et al (199) estimated a VAR regression for a dynamic CAP model using data from the 1910-1920 Scandanavian stock exchange. They found a strongly statistically significant negative coefficient on corporate tax rates. This suggests that such taxes may have a negative effect on publicly traded securities. However, as their data was from a limited period with several simultaneous changes in policy, and their results are not robust to \[something here\] , further evidence is needed on this question.”

Use the language of classical 11 statistics:

Hypothesis testing, statistical significance, robustness checks, magnitudes of effects, confidence intervals.

Note that generalisation outside the data depends on an intuitive sense that evidence from one situation is likely to apply to other situations.

“Findings”: How do you (or the cited paper) claim to identify a causal relationship?

This policy was explained by Smith and Johnson (2002) in their research on subsidies and redistribution in higher education. Their results showed that people with higher degree have higher salaries and so pay higher taxes. Thus subsidizing higher education leads to a large social gain.

The results the student discusses seem to show an association between higher degrees and higher salaries. The student seems to imply that the education itself led to higher salaries. This has not been shown by the cited paper. Perhaps people who were able to get into higher education would earn higher salaries anyway. There are ways economists used to try to identify a “causal effect” (by the way, this widely used term is redundant as all effects must have a cause), but a mere association between two variables is not enough

As inflation was systematically lower during periods of recession, we see that too low a level of inflation increases unemployment.

Economists have long debated the nature of this “Phillips curve” relationship. There is much work trying to determine whether the association (to the extent it exists) is a causal one. We could not rule out reverse causality, or third factor that might cause changes in both variables.

4.9 …Stating empirical results

Don’t write: “I accept the null hypothesis.”

Do write: “The results fail to reject the null hypothesis, in spite of a large sample size and an estimate with small standard errors” (if this is the case)

Note: The question of what to infer from acceptance/rejection of null hypotheses is a complex difficult one in Classical (as opposed to Bayesian) statistics. This difficulty is in part philosophical: classical hypothesis testing is deductive , while inference is necessarily inductive.

4.10 What to report

You need to read this paper more clearly; it is not clear what they conclude nor what their evidence is.

4.11 Organising your literature review

A common marking comment:

These papers seem to be discussed in random order – you need some structure organising these papers thematically, by finding, by technique, or chronologically perhaps.

How should you organise it? In what order?

Thematically (usually better)

By method, by theoretical framework, by results or assumptions, by field

Chronologically (perhaps within themes)

Exercise: Compare how the literature review section is organized in papers you are reading.

Figure 4.4: Organising a set of references

Q: What sort of structure am I using in the above outline?

It may also be helpful to make a ‘table’ of the relevant literature, as in the figure below. This will help you get a sense of the methods and results, and how the papers relate, and how to assess the evidence. You may end up putting this in the actual paper.

Figure 4.5: Organisational table from Reinstein and Riener, 2012b

4.12 What if you have trouble reading and understanding a paper?

Consult a survey paper, textbook, or lecture notes that discuss this paper and this topic

Try to find an easier related paper

Ask your supervisor for help; if he or she can

Try to understand what you can; do not try to “fake it”

4.13 Some literature survey do’s and don’ts

Do not cite irrelevant literature.

Do not merely list all the papers you could find.

Discuss them, and their relevance to your paper.

What are their strengths and weaknesses? What techniques do they use, and what assumptions do they rely on? How do they relate to each other?

Use correct citation formats.

Try to find original sources (don’t just cite a web link).

Don’t just cut and paste from other sources. And make sure to attribute every source and every quote. Be clear: which part of your paper is your own work and what is cited from others? The penalties for plagiarism can be severe!

• Critically examine the sources, arguments, and methods

4.14 Comprehension questions: literature review

How to discuss empirical results: “Causal” estimation, e.g., with Instrumental Variables

Which is the best way to state it? 12

“As I prove in table 2, more lawyers lead to slower growth (as demonstrated by the regression analysis evidence).”

“Table 2 provides evidence that a high share of lawyers in a city’s population leads to slower growth.”

3.“Table 2 shows that a high share of lawyers in a city’s population is correlated with slower growth.”

Which is better? 13

• “However, when a set of observable determinants of city growth (such as Census Region growth) are accounted for, the estimate of this effect becomes less precise.”
• “In the correct regression I control for all determinants of city growth and find that there is no effect of lawyers on growth”

Stating empirical results: descriptive

“Using the US data from 1850-1950, I find that inflation is lower during periods of recession. This is statistically significant in a t-test [or whatever test] at the 99% level, and the difference is economically meaningful. This is consistent with the theory of …, which predicts that lower inflation increases unemployment. However, other explanations are possible, including reverse causality, and unmeasured covarying lags and trends.”

“I find a significantly lower level of inflation during periods of recession, and the difference is economically meaningful. This relationship is statistically significant and the data is accurately measured. Thus I find that inflation increases unemployment.”

Some tips on writing a good paper– relevant to literature reviews

• Answer the question
• Provide clear structure and signposting
• Demonstrate an ability for critical analysis
• Refer to your sources
• Produce a coherent, clear argument
• Take time to proofread for style and expresssion
• Source “Assignment Writing Skills EBS 3rd year 2012”"

Answer: only b is a ‘peer reviewed article in a reputable economics journal’. All of these might be useful to cite, however. ↩

False. You need to cite any content and ideas that are not your own. ↩

Answers: 1, 5, and 6. Note that 2 and 3 are too narrow criteria, and 4 is too broad. ↩

or Bayesian if you like ↩

The second one; if this is really causal evidence. ↩

The first one. There is no ‘correct regression’. It is also not really correct in classical statistics to ‘find no effect’. ↩

Difference of a Literature Review and Literature Survey

Hi all, Please don't all laugh at me but I was wondering what is the difference between a literature review and a literature survey? Thanks!

There is no difference. IMO literature survey is perhaps more commonly employed as a term in the USA, but I've read it in British journals as well.

I second that. It's an American term for literature review. I actually have quite a few 'literature surveys' in my papers collection - and they're identical to literature reviews.

u are right guys...to an extent i think. ex if you read in an article or somewhere that Dr A using method X measured glucose concentration in a diabetic patient to be say 30mM while Dr B using method Y,in same patient had 8mM. If you report this as such then thats a SURVEY( more or less retelling), but if u say Dr A's result was 30 while Dr B's was 8 [and add that]; the discrepancy could be DUE TO specificity/accuracy of the different methods etc-that now is CRITIQUING- a RE-view.

[This is an extract of my class room notes,....] [As told by Prof.Dr.Amudavalli Ph.D.] Literature survey is something when you look at a literature[publications]in a surface level or a bird's eye view, or an ariel view. It includes the survey of place people and publications is context of Research. It is a phase where the researcher tries to know of what are all the literatures related to his/her area of interest. And the relevant literatures are short-listed. And in general, a literature survey guides or helps the researcher to define/find out/identify a problem. Whereas a literature review is going into the depth of the literatures surveyed. It is a process of re-examining, evaluating or assessing the short-listed literatures [literature survey phase]. Review of literatures gives a clarity & better understanding of the research/project, etc. Thank You.

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What is the key difference between literature review and related work?

I really can not find a justifiable answer to this question. Are they used interchangeably? One answer that's i found to be true is that we use the term literature review in writing thesis and related work in the writing research paper. but i am not sure if it is correct or not?

• research-process
• literature-review

• 2 Can you perhaps provide an example of somewhere that you've seen "Related work" used in a relevant context? And perhaps the field that you're working in? With the information available from your question, it's not clear to me exactly what you're asking. For the most part, I'd imagine they're the same but you may have a very specific context in mind where some difference is intended. –  Ian_Fin Commented Oct 20, 2016 at 8:09
• 1 A literature review is a chapter in a monograph/thesis, and a related work is a section in a article/paper. –  Frames Catherine White Commented Jul 4, 2017 at 10:43

2 Answers 2

I've been looking last week for the difference between the literature review and the background. And I found this which may help you, a good definition of what the literature supposed to be (in my opinion): https://academia.stackexchange.com/a/49629/57676

I'm not sure, but I think the literature review can be regarded as related work in more storytelling style. And yes, related work is more frequent in research papers because you don't have enough space to "build a conceptual structure that ties together all the key ideas". Therefore, you just describe briefly what has been done and maybe try to compare it theoretically against what you're proposing, I think.

I have also faced this problem of defining the difference between these two terms. I got to write a paper to a conference and since it's my very first paper I was searching for some tutorials on youtube for 'writing a related work section in the paper'. What I found was mainly related to Literature Review. So I guess these two things are almost the same. Also, as it was said previously Literature Review is more frequent in thesises.

Maybe you may find this article useful https://guidetogradschoolsurvival.wordpress.com/2011/04/08/how-to-write-related-work/

at least for me, it was. Good luck!

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• Open access
• Published: 29 July 2024

Natural history in Malan syndrome: survey of 28 adults and literature review

• T. N. Huynh 1 ,
• C. G. Delagrammatikas 2 ,
• L. Chiriatti 3 ,
• A. Panfili 4 , 5 ,
• K. Ventarola 6 ,
• L. A. Menke 7 ,
• M. Tartaglia 3 ,
• S. A. Huisman 1 , 8   na1 &
• M. Priolo   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-4815-9550 9   na1  

Orphanet Journal of Rare Diseases volume  19 , Article number:  282 ( 2024 ) Cite this article

Metrics details

Malan syndrome (MALNS), previously referred to as “Sotos syndrome 2” due to its resemblance to Sotos syndrome (SS), is an ultra-rare neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by overgrowth, typical craniofacial features, intellectual disability (ID), and a range of psychobehavioral, musculoskeletal, vision and neurological signs. As MALNS and SS partly overlap, it is essential to more accurately profile their clinical presentations and highlight their differences in order to improve syndrome specific management. An increasing number of individuals with MALNS reach adult-age though the natural history of the disorder is poorly characterized due to the small number of adult individuals described so far. As a consequence, current guidelines are limited to the pediatric population. Further delineation of MALNS is essential to optimize care in adulthood.

A mixed approach based on cross-sectional data collection with a survey disseminated to caregivers of adults with molecularly confirmed MALNS and literature review was conducted. Twenty-eight caregivers completed the survey. Clinical presentation in adulthood is multisystemic and defined by psychobehavioral comorbidities (96%), musculoskeletal involvement (96%), vision impairment (96%) and neurological complications (86%). The most common signs were anxiety (79%), hypotonia (75%), movement difficulty (75%), scoliosis (64%), problems with coordination (61%), strabismus (57%), constipation (54%), breastbone abnormalities (54%) and advanced bone age during childhood (54%). Impaired vision was complicated by vision decline (36%) and optic atrophy (32%). We report some previously unidentified features, including high pain threshold (46%), incontinence (25%), tremors (21%), muscle hypoplasia (18%) and tics (18%).

Conclusions

This survey in the adult population has allowed a more complete description of the natural history of MALNS. Our findings will contribute to the development and improvement of standards of care for adults with MALNS to assure optimal health monitoring and treatment of evolutive complications. We propose additional recommendations to the previous dataset of clinical evaluations specifically applied to adults. The comparison of MALNS and SS adult presentation highlights significant differences in terms of prevalence and severity of ID, behavioral issues, and vision problems, confirming that a proper differential diagnosis between the two conditions is indispensable to guide physicians and mental health professionals to syndrome specific management.

“Doctor, as our child with intellectual disability (ID) gets older and becomes an adult, what can we expect with such a rare condition?” This is one of the major questions that affected individuals and their caregivers raise to their medical providers in an era where technological advances and diagnostic testing are leading to the identification of an increasing number of previously unrecognized rare and ultra-rare disorders [ 1 , 2 ]. Individuals with developmental delay (DD)/ID are generally molecularly diagnosed at a young age simply because they are under routine pediatric care which increases their chances of receiving proper genetic testing. Similarly, research studies devoted to disclosing genetic causes in rare disorders are mainly conducted in the pediatric population. Consequently, most of the available clinical information concerns childhood; this limitation does not expand on the full spectrum of the disorder and its phenotypical changes over time, also known as the natural history [ 3 ].

Malan syndrome (MALNS) (MIM #614753) is an ultra-rare genetic disorder with an estimated prevalence of < 1/1,000,000 [ 4 ]. It is caused by haploinsufficiency of the nuclear factor I X gene ( NFIX , MIM #164005), due to either heterozygous chromosomal microdeletions involving the 19p13.2 region or loss-of-function (LoF) variants in the NFIX gene, these latter mostly located within exons 2 to 4 [ 5 , 6 ]. NFIX plays an important role in cellular processes during brain and musculoskeletal development. Since its first description in 2010, MALNS has been referred to as “Sotos syndrome 2” or “Sotos-like” as it presents with some similarities to Sotos syndrome (SS, MIM #117550) [ 6 ]. Main characteristics of MALNS include overgrowth at early age, macrocephaly, distinct craniofacial features, DD/ID, and neurological, psychobehavioral, ophthalmological, and musculoskeletal features [ 5 ]. Presently, less than 100 individuals with MALNS have been reported worldwide [ 5 , 7 ]. While it is likely that an increasing number of affected individuals will reach adult-age, literature on the manifestations in adulthood remains limited. Priolo et al. have provided an overview of clinical phenotypes in a large cohort of individuals with MALNS. A total of 80 subjects with ages ranging from 1 to 42 years old have been described. Of these, only thirteen individuals (16%) were of adult-age at the time of assessment [ 5 ]. Moreover, this study did not report data on daily functioning, medical and psychobehavioral management, and impact on adult quality of life (QoL).

Currently, limited guidelines mainly related to the pediatric population of MALNS exist to help with management and follow-up, consequently the support is not always optimal for all ages [ 7 ]. Detailed information is essential for optimal care in later life. Adult individuals with moderate to severe ID are often not able to provide reliable information about their condition. Instead, many rely on their caregivers, who can provide valuable information on their health and behavior. Patient advocacy organizations and support groups represent a significant resource for collecting and sharing data on rare population cohorts [ 3 , 8 ].

In collaboration with the international patient advocacy group, the Malan Syndrome Foundation, this study characterizes the natural history of MALNS in adult individuals as reported by their caregivers. Given the range of comorbidities in MALNS, the participants were asked to answer the following primary question: which medical and psychobehavioral problems are still present in adulthood? Secondly, we examined the age of onset to establish which problems manifested at adult age. Other questions of the study were mainly represented by daily functioning, the impact of medical problems on adult QoL, the medical and psychobehavioral treatments and their outcomes. The data collected on adult MALNS individuals in this study were then compared to adult manifestations in SS.

A mixed descriptive study design was used, including a literature review and cross-sectional caregiver-reported data collection with an online survey.

Literature review

PubMed and EMBASE databases were searched to find publications using key words “Malan syndrome” OR “MALNS” OR “Malan overgrowth” OR “Sotos type 2” OR “Sotos type II” OR “NFIX overgrowth” OR “Sotos syndrome 2” OR “Sotos-like”. Only publications in English or Dutch language were included. Duplications were removed manually. Articles were excluded if they did not describe adult individuals with MALNS. Citations of included articles were reviewed to identify additional relevant publications. A single article, reporting a detailed clinical characterization of a large cohort of adult individuals with SS was used for comparison to current data. [ 9 ].

Study population

Subjects eligible to participate in this study were parents or primary caregivers of adult individuals (18 years and older) with a molecularly confirmed diagnosis of MALNS. Participants were internationally recruited in collaboration with the Malan Syndrome Foundation and Malan syndrome centers of expertise in AORN “A. Cardarelli” in Naples and Amsterdam University Medical Centers. Participation was voluntary.

The English language-survey was adapted from two dedicated surveys: the adult natural history Rubinstein-Taybi syndrome study (Douzgou et al. [ 10 ]) and Sanford CoRDS Patient Registry [ 11 ] and modified with disease- and adult-specific questions for MALNS. The survey consisted of 115 questions and included closed (single or multiple choice) and open-ended questions. They comprised thirteen themes: general information, neurological, musculoskeletal, cardiovascular, gastrointestinal, respiratory, sleep, vision, and hearing, psychobehavioral, other medical problems, everyday life, medical and psychobehavioral treatments, and follow-up. Additionally, respondents were asked if current or past medical problems had an impact on adult QoL and to specify the medical problem if this was the case (see Additional file 1 ).

All participants received an email sent through Castor EDC, a secured electronic clinical data management platform, which contained a link to the online survey between April 2023 and May 2023. Participants with limited English proficiency received assistance from their physician or members of the research team to fill out the survey. Researchers were permitted to enter participant’s responses in Castor EDC if the participants needed assistance. Reminders were sent out through the Malan Syndrome Foundation.

Data management

Data was pseudo-anonymized and stored in Castor EDC. Participants were coded by serial number, and their email was linked for survey dissemination. IP-addresses were not collected. Access to the database was only granted to members of the research team.

Statistical analyses

Data was analyzed using IBM SPSS Statistics (version 28) and descriptive statistics were performed to calculate frequencies and percentages. The Fisher’s exact test was used to compare symptoms between MALNS and SS, and differences with a p value < 0.05 were considered statistically significant.

Literature search yielded eight articles with nineteen molecularly confirmed MALNS adult individuals (10 men and 9 women; age range: from 18 to 42 years, median 22 years). [ 5 , 6 , 7 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 ] Full descriptions per adult individual are available in Supplementary Table 1 (see Additional file 2 ). The most frequent reported phenotypic features are displayed in Supplementary Fig. 1 (see Additional file 3 ) in comparison to results of this survey. Nearly everyone had manifestations of overgrowth: postnatal height > 2 SD (11/18) and head circumference > 2 SD (14/17). Typical MALNS craniofacial features were present in all individuals, mainly represented by prominent forehead (19/19) and chin (16/19) with a long, narrow, and triangular face (18/18). Impaired vision was mostly attributed to strabismus (10/18) and refractive disorders (8/16). Psychobehavioral comorbidities had a high prevalence: autistiform traits (8/18) and anxiety (4/6) were often observed. Priolo et al. [ 5 ] reported anxiety in 52% of cases, including children and adults, but stratified prevalence in childhood and adulthood was not provided.

Demographic data

A total of 28 respondents (16 men and 12 women; age range: 18–60 years (median 23.5 years)) completed the survey from eight different countries: Australia, Canada, Chile, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, United Kingdom, and United States of America. All respondents were first-degree family members of an adult individual with molecularly confirmed MALNS. Age distribution is shown in Supplementary Fig. 2 (see Additional file 3 ). Phenotypical appearance of the oldest individual (60 years) and age-related changes are shown in Fig.  1 . Among the participants, seven have been previously described as children in Priolo et al. 2012 (subject 20) and 2018 (subjects 8 and 28), Gurrieri et al. (subject 18) and Macchiaiolo et al. (subjects 19, 21 and 22) [ 5 , 7 , 17 , 18 ]. These individuals were contacted to ask for their participation in this adult survey.

Phenotypical appearance of the oldest participant of the present survey (60 years old) and his age-related changes. Age in years is described below each picture

Most of the individuals (24/28; 86%) lived at home with their primary caregiver(s), while the remaining (4/28; 14%) lived in assisted living homes. Except for one, all individuals were molecularly confirmed at the age of 10 years or older. Further detailed genotypical data is illustrated in Supplementary Table 2 (see Additional file 3 ). Microdeletions were present in six individuals (21%).

The male mean height, weight, and head circumference was 185.7 cm (+ 1.29 SD), 75.1 kg (+ 0.37 SD), and 60.9 cm (+ 4 SD), respectively, compared to women’s 177.3 cm (+ 2.18 SD), 64.1 kg (+ 0.41 SD), and 61.0 cm (+ 6 SD), respectively.

Daily functioning

Among the individuals who communicated verbally (82%), 22 caregivers provided details about their child’s level of speech: 16/22 (73%) had a level of speech using 5 + word sentences, 4/22 (18%) communicated with 2–3-word combinations, and 2/22 (9%) communicated with single words. For those with limited verbal communication, sign language and/or alternative/augmentative communication systems were used (Fig.  2 A). Twenty-one caregivers reported on changes from childhood to adulthood. Among them, 16 (76%) experienced an improvement in speech, four (19%) observed no changes, and one caregiver stated a gradual decline in level of speech in their affected 43-year-old son. Descriptions of daily functioning including method of communication, level of independency in everyday life, and type of social activities is shown in Fig.  2 A, B, and C respectively. The majority of individuals were socially active (Fig.  2 B), participating in a variety of activities (Fig.  2 C). Eight individuals (29%) had a job with supervision. However, none of the individuals was independent in their everyday life (e.g., ability to go grocery shopping independently). Only one individual (3.6%) was able to take public transportation without assistance.

Daily functioning. A . Method of communication B . Everyday life C . Type of social activities

Health and behavior in adulthood

All caregivers reported multisystemic involvement. The most frequent issues were represented by psychobehavioral comorbidities (27/28; 96%), musculoskeletal involvement (27/28; 96%) and vision impairment (27/28; 96%). Neurological complications (24/28; 86%) were also common. Detailed information on signs and symptoms of the aforementioned four body systems is illustrated in Fig.  3 . When considering psychobehavioral problems, anxiety was observed in the majority of individuals (22/28; 79%). Other frequently reported psychobehavioral problems included limited interests, repetitive movements and echolalia (14/28; 50%), autistic behavior (13/28; 46%), and mood abnormalities/sudden mood changes (11/28; 39%) (Fig.  3 A). Hypotonia (21/28; 75%), scoliosis (18/28; 64%), breastbone abnormalities (15/28; 54%) and advanced bone age during childhood (15/28; 54%) were common musculoskeletal features (Fig.  3 B). Another relevant observation included bone fractures, which were reported in a minority of subjects (5/28;18%). Fractures were typically located at the tibia, fibula, and foot. Among these, one individual presented with multiple episodes of tibial fractures (twice on the right tibia and once on the left one) at 2, 4 and 5 years of age. Frequent vision findings were strabismus (16/28; 57%) and vision decline (10/28; 36%) (Fig.  3 C). Nine individuals (32%) had optic atrophy; among them, eight presented with a stable condition and one experienced a progression of disease. Refractive disorders (6/28; 21%) included myopia and astigmatism. Among the neurological complications, movement difficulty and problems with coordination were present in more than two thirds of the individuals, and thirteen individuals (46%) had seizures/EEG anomalies (Fig.  3 D). Less frequently reported features are presented in Supplementary Table 3 (see Additional file 3 ).

Features per body system. A , Psychobehavioral; B , Musculoskeletal; C , Vision; D , Neurological

Additional reported medical problems, involving the cardiovascular and gastrointestinal systems, hearing, sleep and wakefulness, are provided in Supplementary Table 4 (see Additional file 3 ). More than half of the individuals had constipation (15/28; 54%). Hypersensitivity to noise (13/28; 46%) was frequently reported. Sleep related issues (20/28; 71%) were represented by an increased need for sleep (9/28; 32%), difficulty staying asleep/awaking frequently during night (9/28; 32%), sleep apnea (6/28; 21%) and difficulty falling asleep (4/28; 14%). Among those showing an increased need for sleep, most individuals (7/9; 78%) had an increased need for night-time sleep, while a minority (2/9; 22%) had an increased need for daytime sleep, with additional mood changes occurring when they were not allowed to sleep (4/9; 44%).

Dilated aorta and valve defect were amongst the cardiological complications reported in 8 out 28 subjects (29%). Aortic dilatation was diagnosed at birth and 10 and 30 years of age in the three affected subjects, respectively. A list of medical problems with age of onset or diagnosis reported in adulthood is provided in Table  1 .

Impact on adult quality of life

The medical issues evidenced in the survey had a significant impact on QoL in most of the individuals. The most relevant are reported as follows: psychobehavioral (24/28; 86%), musculoskeletal (22/28; 79%), vision and hearing (22/28; 79%), neurological (18/28; 64%), gastrointestinal (9/28; 32%), sleep (9/28; 32%), respiratory (5/28; 18%) and cardiovascular (4/28; 14%). When considering the severity of symptoms and their influence on QoL, vision problems (12/28; 43%), problems with coordination and movement (12/28; 43%), anxiety (11/28; 39%), and scoliosis (8/28; 29%) were considered as having the most profound impact on adult QoL.

Medical, surgical and psychobehavioral treatments

A summary of the medical, surgical and psychobehavioral treatments during life and their outcomes is illustrated in Fig.  4 A and B, respectively. Medication was taken in 86% of the cases. A list of all medications and their benefits is provided in Supplementary Table 5 (see Additional file 3 ). The most frequent medications were represented by psychotropic and antiepileptic drugs. Fourteen of the twenty-four individuals (58%) taking medications were taking one or multiple psychotropic drugs. A majority of the subpopulation with EEG anomalies required antiepileptic drug therapy (10/13; 77%). Twenty-three caregivers provided details about required help in taking medication. Two individuals (8.7%) were able to take medication independently, while the majority required assistance. Nine individuals (38%) experienced difficulties with intake and administration, which required crushing of medicines or intake with thickened liquids. Behavioral and intellectual obstacles resulting in inability to properly administer or measure out medication, reluctancy or refusal were reported in 5 individuals (21.7%).

Summary of medical and psychobehavioral treatments. A . Type of treatment(s) B . Outcome(s) of treatment(s)

While over 40% of the individuals (12/28) had surgery at least once in adulthood, the problems requiring intervention were generally nonspecific and common in the general adult population. However, spinal surgery seems to be a common intervention among MALNS population. Eighteen individuals presented with scoliosis (64%), nine of which showed a mixed presentation of scoliosis and kyphosis (32%). Nearly half of affected subjects (8/18; 44%) underwent spinal surgery during their life (7 scoliosis and 1 scoliosis/kyphosis), three of these individuals experienced surgical correction during adulthood.

Information was obtained on the types of professional figures who followed up individuals with MALNS either for general medical problems (Fig.  5 A) and mental health issues (Fig.  5 B). As expected, general practitioners were the most common professional involved in general care and follow up, followed by different specialists on the basis of specific medical problems. Of note, only a minority of individuals (8/28; 29%) were regularly monitored in a multidisciplinary center with expertise in MALNS. This could be related to difficulty in forming a dedicated multi-professional team due to lack of specific expertise on MALNS management, as generally observed for several ultrarare disorders. [ 19 ] Frequency of health checks generally ranged from once (18/28; 64%) to twice (4/28; 14%) a year. Periodic follow-up was not considered in the remaining individuals, who required medical consultation in occurrence of specific concerns. While all individuals were monitored for medical issues, strikingly, over half of subjects (15/28; 54%) did not have a regular follow-up for mental health.

Follow-up in adult individuals with MALNS. A . Type of professional monitoring medical issues B . Type of professional monitoring mental health

Adult MALNS and SS clinical presentation: similarities and differences

MALNS and SS are two overgrowth conditions that are considered in differential diagnosis. Since its first description, MALNS has been referred to as “Sotos syndrome 2”, although this definition is now outdated and should no longer be used. [ 6 ] The currently collected data were compared to the previously reported adult survey in a population of 44 individuals with SS, which was formulated to collect data that were comparable with the present ones, [ 9 ], to highlight similarities and differences in the adult populations for the two syndromes and to better aid clinicians with diagnostics and management (Table  2 ). Several signs significantly differ in terms of prevalence and severity. DD/ID is usually more severe in MALNS with respect to SS ( p  = 0.00194). A significant proportion of individuals with SS has been reported to have normal intellectual development or mild ID (18% to 39%, respectively). Conversely, normal intellectual development has not been reported in MALNS, while mild ID has been rarely observed. [ 7 , 20 , 21 ] Similarly, QoL and daily functioning abilities seem to be more preserved in the SS adult population, especially in those with mild ID who were completely independent in self-caring, better performing and, in most cases, were employed in a protected context. Behavior and psychiatric issues have been reported in a minority of adult individuals with SS (20%). Although the spectrum of presentation ( e.g. , anxiety, autistiform behavior, anger/aggressive behavior) may be largely overlapping, these features are less represented in the adult SS population compared to the adult MALNS population ( p  = 0.00001). Ophthalmic abnormalities are more common in MALNS in comparison to SS [ 22 ]; in particular, optic nerve hypoplasia (ONH) or optic nerve atrophy (ONA) are rare events in SS ( p  = 0.0005). [ 22 , 23 ] Musculoskeletal anomalies are in general less frequent and severe in SS with the exception of scoliosis. Half of the adults with SS presented with scoliosis and, among them, 46% required surgical correction. A low body mass index (BMI) is rarely observed in SS, as well as a slender habitus with low muscular build ( p  = 0.0024 and p  = 0.00001, respectively). Of note, use of tube feeding has rarely been reported in MALNS to treat underweight [ 16 ] (present data). Cardiac anomalies are observed in SS in 20% of individuals regardless of age, in line with adults with MALNS, which showed a prevalence of 29% (8/28) [ 24 ]. Three MALNS individuals out of 28 (11%) presented with aortic dilatation. Of note, four adult individuals with SS have been reported with aortic dilatation as well, (9%) in line with the occurrence of this specific anomaly in MALNS. Aortic dilatation has been also reported in other overgrowth conditions, such as Tatton-Brown-Rahman syndrome [ 25 ]. Collectively, these data provide evidence for an association with aortic disease in overgrowth syndromes, and suggest cardiovascular surveillance into adulthood. Finally, four SS female individuals had children. To the best of our knowledge, reproductive fitness in MALNS is extremely low, and there are no reports of MALNS adults with children, although four individuals have been reported to be sexually active (Fig.  2 B).

Based on the present data and previous experience in the pediatric population, individuals with overgrowth and moderate to severe ID, slender habitus with or without low BMI, ophthalmologic issues, musculoskeletal problems (mainly scoliosis) and psychobehavioral issues strongly impacting QoL should be mainly addressed towards a clinical diagnosis of MALNS with respect to SS, although a molecular confirmation through whole exome sequencing or an overgrowth multigene panel including NFIX, NSD1 and other genes of interest in differential diagnosis is highly recommended.

This is the first study providing data on the natural history and management of MALNS, and its impact on QoL in the largest molecularly confirmed cohort of adult individuals with MALNS (N = 28) from the perspectives of caregivers.

Our data indicate that adult individuals with MALNS may present with different occurrence of some cardinal features of the disorder with respect to childhood and adolescence. MALNS is an overgrowth disorder in which a height higher than two SD is observed in more than half of the children and adolescents [ 5 ]. In our cohort, only nine individuals (32%; 5 men/4 women) showed a height higher than two SD. Among these subjects, two had spinal surgery. Our results confirm that overgrowth is less prominent in adulthood. On the other hand, macrocephaly still remains the most distinctive sign of overgrowth in MALNS, as head circumference (OFC) was above two SD in all individuals (N = 16) whose OFC was reported.

This survey also allowed us to highlight some interesting data in adaptive functioning skills with a relevant data in communication abilities in MALNS. As expected by previous reports, [ 20 ], all participants indicate impaired language skills in childhood, but the majority of the adults are able to communicate verbally (23/28; 82%). Unexpectedly, 76% of individuals (16/21) showed improvement in speech, meaning that language skills can become better with age. This information suggests partial recovery and/or late improvement of speech, which should be considered when counseling families diagnosed with MALNS in childhood. Adaptive functioning assessment is usually performed with the Vineland adaptive behavior scale—second edition (VABS-II), which specifically explores abilities in three different domains (communication, socialization and daily living skills). Apparent contrasting results for the two other domains (i.e.: socialization and daily living skills) has previously been evidenced between pediatric and adult MALNS populations [ 20 , 26 ] Specifically, adult MALNS have been found to gradually improve with time in daily living skills eventually reaching an average score later than typical and, in general, performing better than expected [ 26 ].

When considering the most frequent medical problems, the clinical presentation in adulthood is mainly characterized by a high prevalence of psychobehavioral comorbidities (96%). They include anxiety (79%), limited interests, repetitive movements and echolalia (50%), autistic traits (46%) and mood abnormalities (39%). These observations show consistency with previous literature, which reported a prevalence between 52 and 94%, mainly represented by anxiety and autistic-like behavior [ 5 , 7 , 21 ]. Notably, despite the high rate, more than half of the individuals (N = 15) were not under direct care and follow-up of mental health professionals. This result may be traced back to several causes. The transition from pediatric to adult healthcare system remains challenging for affected individuals with neurodevelopmental disorders as they (and indirectly their families/caregivers) invariably encounter several obstacles. They are frequently forced to change referring specialists who, in most cases, do not have experience in dealing with rare diseases and their dedicated care. [ 27 , 28 ] In MALNS individuals, the high anxiety levels in the medical setting and examinations by unfamiliar physicians could lead to less willingness to apply to adult healthcare services. Eventually, these factors put affected individuals at risk of discontinuous and non-adequate support. [ 27 ].

In the present cohort, the treatment of psychobehavioral comorbidities was mainly pharmacological (14/27; 52%) whereas only a few individuals received non-pharmacological treatments, such as psychotherapy and psychoeducation (N = 5). A slightly higher pharmacological treatment has been reported in individuals diagnosed with Fragile X syndrome (63%), whereas prevalence of psychotropic usage in Prader-Willi syndrome (37%) appears to be less [ 29 , 30 ]. Mental health services are more prone to prescribe psychotropic medication, mainly antipsychotics, in adults with ID even in the absence of concurrent psychiatric symptoms [ 31 ]. High doses and polypharmacy are also common practice in this population [ 32 ]. The use of psychotropic drugs is much higher than in the general population [ 33 ]. Based on these clinically relevant findings, we suggest that pharmacological treatment should only be prescribed after proper interdisciplinary assessment, under close monitoring of efficacy and side-effects. Psychological therapy is also suggested to be moderately effective in people with ID. However, concerns regarding lack of experience with this population amongst mental health professionals and the notion that their cognitive problems are a barrier for proper engagement limit the inclusion of psychotherapy in psychobehavioral management [ 34 ]. Half of the caregivers reported that drug therapy was effective whereas the other half did not provide an answer (Fig.  4 B). This suggests that caregivers find it difficult to define effectiveness of drug therapy and/or how they improved their child’s behavior. The benefit of different psychotropic drugs varies tremendously, which highlights the complexity of behavior in individuals with MALNS as seen in Supplementary Table 5 (see Additional file 3 ). The importance of a proper psychobehavioral assessment in MALNS has been previously underlined to aid clinicians in timely diagnosis and early intervention at all ages [ 20 , 21 ]. Our results confirm the usefulness of psychological surveillance also in adulthood. When considering the significant impact of psychobehavioral issues on adult QoL, the need to include a mental health professional in management of adult individuals is highly recommended.

Involvement of the musculoskeletal system is characteristic of MALNS. Previous reports have identified hypotonia (50–76%), abnormal spine curvatures (32–75%), advanced bone age (80%) and flat feet (69%) as common features [ 5 , 7 ]. We found consistent results regarding hypotonia (75%) and spine anomalies (including scoliosis and/or kyphosis) (64%). These numbers are in line with those in the pediatric cohort [ 7 ]. Only half of the adults had an advanced bone age during childhood. As bone age is assessed in children who present with growth abnormalities, those who show overgrowth are more likely to be evaluated and diagnosed [ 35 ]. Indeed, there is evidence that advanced bone age is hard to be properly confirmed after early infancy so it might be likely that this specific feature has not been investigated in individuals with MALNS who were molecularly diagnosed in late childhood or adolescence. Five individuals had bone fractures, which mostly occurred during childhood. Despite the small number of associated osteoporosis (N = 3), the increased risk of skeletal fractures suggests that further investigations on bone mineral density in adolescent and adult individuals should be required, as previously reported, [ 7 ] and that vitamin D supplementation should be considered.

Problems with coordination was a commonly observed symptom with a higher prevalence compared to the pediatric population. Seventeen individuals (61%) experienced this problem compared to three cases reported in the study by Macchiaiolo et al. (19%). The latter were evaluated by medical professionals and findings were objectified. Moreover, the authors recorded ataxia as sporadic episodes and part of a spectrum of neurovegetative signs [ 7 ]. In the present survey, coordination problems were initially defined as “ataxia” and might be misinterpreted by caregivers. The discrepancies between previous data and the present findings can be explained due to this difference in perception by caregivers. They were specifically re- interviewed on this topic, but they could not provide a real distinction between general coordination problems and a medical diagnosis of ataxia. As we cannot objectively verify the occurrence of ataxia in the present adult cohort, it is likely that coordination problems are due, in part, to concomitant visuospatial and visuomotor deficiencies that are invariably observed in MALNS [ 7 , 20 ].

Seizures/EEG anomalies were present in 46% of the individuals (13/28), while previous studies reported a prevalence of 26.5% and 63% [ 5 , 7 ]. EEG anomalies were not constantly associated with seizures, in line with previous observations considering other cohorts of individuals with other neurodevelopmental disorders [ 36 , 37 ]. In the present survey, both features were incorporated into a single question, and therefore could not be separated into two categories. Ten out of thirteen adults (77%) were treated with antiepileptics and were presumed to have developed seizures, whereas the remaining three were asymptomatic. This finding is in contrast with what had previously been reported in the pediatric population [ 7 ], which evidenced a high prevalence of EEG anomalies without development of seizures. Overall these findings indicate that late manifestation of seizures should be carefully monitored in adult individuals. In particular, late adult-onset of seizures occurred in three subjects (Table  1 ), who carried a pathogenic intragenic NFIX variant. While, previous reports suggested that deletions involving the CACNA1A gene could play a role and potentially increase the risk of developing seizures, [ 5 , 14 , 38 ] the present findings highlight the need for continuous monitoring of possible seizures in adulthood regardless of type of mutation or microdeletion.

Brain abnormalities, such as wide ventricles, corpus callosum hypoplasia, Chiari malformation and brain atrophy have been reported in MALNS [ 5 ]. We observed only one individual with Chiari malformation who was diagnosed at 17 years. As we did not ascertain whether all adults have had an MRI nor did we include a separate question in the survey, these features may have been underreported.

The other frequently described features of MALNS in adulthood included visual problems (96%). We observed strabismus in 57% of the adults, comparable with previous reports (63%) [ 7 ], all diagnosed in either infancy or childhood. Refractive disorders were less prevalent (21% vs. 75–81%) [ 5 , 7 ]. We also report relatively high rates of ONA/ONH (32%) and vision decline (10/28; 36%). ONH/ONA are congenital conditions that have been previously reported with a prevalence of 21–25% in pediatric MALNS individuals [ 5 , 7 ]. Individuals with ONH usually develop nystagmus and strabismus at an early age [ 39 ]. ONA was not reported separately before and was grouped under ONH in previous surveys thus we cannot properly verify if there is an increased occurrence in adulthood [ 5 , 7 ]. ONA refers to irreversible loss of nerve fibers caused by a wide range of diseases and patients often present with a loss of visual field [ 40 ]. This might suggest that those with vision decline could potentially have underlying ONA. Over half of the adults (6/10; 60%) with vision decline were also diagnosed with ONA. Three individuals were diagnosed with vision decline in adulthood mainly due to adult-related complications (cataracts and presbyopia), while the rest manifested during childhood. Despite the observed vision decline, no cause was determined in two patients. The exams to determine ONA include visual field tests, magnetic resonance imaging and optical coherence tomography [ 40 ]. However due to their anxiety and ID, consultation of ophthalmologists and subsequent examinations may be limited in individuals with MALNS. All these observations, together with the high prevalence of visual impairment in the adult MALNS population, highlights the importance of routine ophthalmologic evaluations at all ages, as previously suggested [ 7 ]. This is anticipated to aid in identifying causes that can be accommodated/treated before significant vision loss occurs.

Adults display a lower prevalence of hypersensitivity to noise with respect to children and young adults (46% vs. 67–81%) [ 7 , 21 ]. This could be explained by the difficulty to secure an accurate diagnosis that is obtained through audiometry to verify the level of discomfort in decibels, together with dedicated questionnaires to assess severity [ 41 ]. It is possible that individuals in our cohort have not all been properly evaluated, and the number could be much higher. However, our findings suggest that hypersensitivity to noise might decrease with age.

Other observations include constipation in more than half of the cases (54%). This is consistent with the pediatric prevalence (50%) [ 7 ], confirming that it is a significant symptom to adequately treat either early in childhood or in adulthood. Due to ID and language difficulties, it may be challenging for individuals with MALNS to express discomfort or pain. Manifestations of constipation can often present as sleep or behavioral problems [ 42 ]. Other gastrointestinal symptoms were not described in previous adult case reports.

We report a high frequency of sleep problems in MALNS (20/28; 71%). This issue seems not to have been reported in the literature. Sleep abnormalities are common in individuals with ID across all ages and impaired sleep is associated with challenging behavior [ 43 ]. It is also possible that anxiety may worsen sleep problems, and this could explain the high occurrence of this issue in the adult MALNS population. Based on both high frequencies of constipation and sleep anomalies, we strongly suggest proper evaluation of gastrointestinal and sleep issues in the adults with MALNS who present with psychobehavioral comorbidities.

High pain threshold (46%), skin issues (32%), incontinence (25%), tremors (21%), muscle hypoplasia (18%) and tics (18%) had not previously been reported in MALNS. Three out five adults with tics presented with coexistent seizures for which antiepileptic therapy was required. This might suggest that medication could possibly contribute to the manifestation of tics, as previously reported [ 44 ].

A high pain threshold is characteristic of Prader-Willi syndrome caused by dysfunction of the hypothalamus [ 45 ]. For MALNS it remains unclear whether the parents’ reported high pain threshold is consistent with a higher threshold point at which a stimulus becomes painful or that it underlies altered pain tolerance or reactions. As mentioned before, individuals with ID do not always provide reliable self-reporting of pain and have to rely on their caregivers to observe behavior that indicates pain [ 46 ]. Children and adolescents with ID display a higher prevalence of incontinence [ 47 ]. It is possible that there is a correlation between pain perception and incontinence as affected individuals might be less aware of the sensory signals of a full bladder. Caregivers and professionals should keep an altered pain perception in mind when evaluating any medical issues.

Skin issues could not be properly specified to obtain possible occurrence of dermatologic conditions. They generally occurred during childhood. Therefore, an age-related association seems less likely. A recurrent finding were eczemas, which are a relatively common in the general population [ 48 ].

Six individuals presented with “tremors” as an additional feature with variable onset varied (from birth to adulthood) and possibly related to different triggering events, including anti-psychotic drugs. Follow-up with a neurologist is desired to accurately objectify these tremors and further examine associations with psychobehavioral comorbidities and seizures.

A diminished volume in muscle tissue has been observed in a minority of individuals (5/28; 18%). This sign is invariably associated with low BMI (see below). Although we do not have a clear explanation about this feature, we might hypothesize a connection between the two signs. NFIX plays an important role in skeletal muscle development, regulating the switch from embryonic to fetal myogenesis by specifically activating fetal genes [ 49 ]. This crucial role has been also established in the mouse model of the disorder in which an inhibitory mechanism at the promoter of the gene that encodes for myostatin , a TGF-β family member with anti-myogenic properties, has been evidenced [ 50 ]. This finding is consistent with the hypothesis that MALNS individuals could show a reduced muscular mass due to the inability to gain weight despite adequate nutrient intake [ 7 ]. On the other hand, it might be possible that a diminished muscular mass might be also related to decreased mobility and diminished physical activity due to movement and coordination problems, which are frequently observed in these subjects. Further studies are needed to confirm a possible concomitant effect of these causes on muscle volume in MALNS.

Our survey evidenced some age-related signs diagnosed at a younger age than normally expected. We observed three individuals affected with cataracts at 4, 13 and 22 years of age. Cataract surveillance should be performed at all ages in MALNS population due to possible anticipation of early-onset in these individuals.

The oldest individual (60 years old) presented with a relatively stable health and reported adult-onset features, such as presbyopia, dilated left ventricle and hypertension. Signs such as acid reflux and inflammatory bowel disease were also sporadically reported in adulthood. Again, these issues might not be directly related to MALNS, as these are complications statistically normally occurring in the general adult population [ 51 , 52 , 53 ]. Cancer, macular degeneration, and stroke were not reported.

We observed obesity in three individuals (11%), which is in contrast to slender habitus and low BMI typical of pediatric MALNS [ 5 , 7 ]. Underweight/low BMI was also observed in six adult individuals (21%). Among them, one individual required nasogastric tube feeding and involvement of a dietitian. Tube feeding-dependence had previously been reported [ 16 ]. These observations indicate that weight and BMI should be evaluated at every follow-up appointment, and stress the importance of sufficient calorie intake, with the potential help of a dietitian, to prevent complications and possibly avoid tube feeding.

MALNS is currently not classified as a disorder predisposing for cardiovascular disease. Previous series have reported dilatation of large blood vessels; among them, one had dilatation of the pulmonary arteries and five presented with dilatation of the aorta [ 5 , 13 , 54 ]. One individual showed progression of the aortic dilatation between 35 and 38 years of age with dissection [ 13 ]. Macchiaiolo et al. [ 7 ] evaluated 16 pediatric individuals with echocardiography and only observed mitral regurgitation in 31%. We report three individuals with aortic dilatation diagnosed at various ages (birth, 10 years, and 30 years). Clinical significance and progression of dilatation cannot be determined yet, but these observations signify the importance of cardiological evaluation in all affected individuals at diagnosis and follow-up.

Preliminary dataset of recommendations for management and follow-up in adulthood

The 1-year surveillance study by Macchiaiolo et al. provided a set of recommendations for management and follow-up of all individuals with MALNS [ 7 ]. Based on the presently collected data, we propose additional recommendations focused on adulthood (Table  3 ).

Strengths and limitations

Strengths of this study include close collaboration with the international patient advocacy group, the Malan Syndrome Foundation, and the Italian and Dutch MALNS centers of expertise, which allowed easy access to recruit all known caregivers of adult individuals with MALNS. Additionally, combined input from these organized entities has helped to interpret open answers and establish uniform definition of symptoms.

In general, we observed a high response rate of 18/28 adult individuals (64%) who were registered at the Malan Syndrome Foundation. Despite the small number of participants, the present cohort is representative with respect to the prevalence of this ultra-rare disorder. The adapted survey was extensive, and questions covered a wide range of aspects of health, behavior, daily functioning, and treatments. The cross-sectional approach allowed us to quickly collect data in a short period of time and establish prevalence of multiple signs and symptoms. However, this approach also has some limitations such as the inability to objectively assess signs and symptoms and determine their prevalence. There is also recall bias risk as participants may not always be able to remember information correctly. We also had some missing data, mostly concerning age of onset or diagnosis and, type and outcomes of treatments, as not all questions were required to be answered.

Collecting information in the adult population has allowed a more complete description of the natural history of MALNS. Individuals with MALNS are burdened with psychobehavioral comorbidities, musculoskeletal problems, vision impairment and neurological issues that persist in adulthood, have a significant impact on QoL and require life-long support and health monitoring. A possible partial recovery of communication abilities in adults should be considered in genetic counseling of families diagnosed with MALNS in childhood. The comparison of MALNS and SS adult presentation highlights similarities and differences to clinically guide physicians with proper diagnostics and management. Future research should focus on further delineation of the genotype–phenotype correlation in a longitudinal setting to accurately assess incidence of symptoms and progression of the disorder. Findings will contribute to the development of standards for clinical evaluation and physical and mental health management in adults with MALNS to assure optimal monitoring and treatment of possible evolutive complications.

Availability of data and materials

All data generated or analyzed during this study are included in this published article and its supplementary files.

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Acknowledgements

We thank all the adult individuals with MALNS and their families for their participation and valuable input to the study. We thank the Malan Syndrome Foundation for their help with recruitment of participants. We thank the Sanford CoRDS Patient Registry and authors of the adult natural history Rubinstein-Taybi syndrome study for providing the materials to construct the survey. This work is generated within the European Reference Network ITHACA.

This work was supported, in part, by funding from the Italian Ministry of Health (Current Research Funds and PNRR-MR1-2022-12376811, to MT).

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S. A. Huisman and M. Priolo have contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

Department of Pediatrics, Emma Children’s Hospital, Amsterdam UMC, University of Amsterdam, Meibergdreef 9, 1105 AZ, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

T. N. Huynh & S. A. Huisman

Director of Research, Malan Syndrome Foundation, Old Bridge, NJ, USA

C. G. Delagrammatikas

Molecular Genetics and Functional Genomics, Ospedale Pediatrico Bambino Gesù, IRCCS, Viale di San Paolo 15, 00146, Rome, Italy

L. Chiriatti & M. Tartaglia

Scientific Directorate, Fondazione Policlinico Universitario A. Gemelli IRCCS, Rome, Italy

Medical Genetics Unit, Fondazione Policlinico Universitario A. Gemelli IRCCS, Rome, Italy

Malan Syndrome Foundation, Old Bridge, NJ, USA

K. Ventarola

Department of Pediatrics, Emma Children’s Hospital, Amsterdam UMC, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam Reproduction and Development Research Institute, Meibergdreef 9, 1105 AZ, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

L. A. Menke

Zodiak, Prinsenstichting, 1444 JE, Purmerend, The Netherlands

S. A. Huisman

Operative Unit of Medical Genetics and Laboratory of Genetics, AORN A.Cardarelli, Via Cardarelli 9, 80131, Naples, Italy

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Contributions

TNH, SAH and MP conceptualized and designed the study, and were responsible for the coordination of the study. TNH, CGD, LC, AP, SAH and MP contacted participants and registered cases. TNH extracted and analyzed data. TNH, CGD, MT, SAH and MP contributed to interpretation of data. TNH wrote the article draft, and CGD, KV, LAM, MT, SAH and MP critically reviewed the article draft. All authors approved of the final manuscript.

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Correspondence to S. A. Huisman or M. Priolo .

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A waiver for formal approval was obtained from the Institutional Review Board of Amsterdam University Medical Centers, the Netherlands (W23_133 # 23.162). This investigation was performed in accordance with the ethical principles of the Declaration of Helsinki. Informed consent was obtained by all participants and information was provided voluntarily. Participations received no compensation for their participation.

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All respondents gave written consent for publication of clinical and genetic data. Written informed consent for publication of one patient’s clinical images was obtained from the parent of the patient. A copy of the consent form is available for review by the Editor of this journal.

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Supplementary Information

Additional file 1.

. English Malan syndrome adult survey.

Additional file 2

. Supplemental material: table 1 literature review of adults with Malan syndrome.

Additional file 3

. Supplemental material: Tables 2-5 and Figures 1-2.

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Huynh, T.N., Delagrammatikas, C.G., Chiriatti, L. et al. Natural history in Malan syndrome: survey of 28 adults and literature review. Orphanet J Rare Dis 19 , 282 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1186/s13023-024-03288-6

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DOI : https://doi.org/10.1186/s13023-024-03288-6

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Cost-related drivers and barriers of passivhaus: a systematic literature review.

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2. background, 2.1. passivhaus development and requirements, 2.2. cost of passivhaus, 3. research methodology, 4. analysis/results, context of the selected papers, 5. discussion, 5.1. drivers of passivhaus, 5.1.1. improved building elements, 5.1.2. improved indoor air quality, 5.1.3. improved market conditions, 5.1.4. improved national regulations, 5.1.5. available financial incentives, 5.1.6. continuous research outputs, 5.1.7. educational awareness, 5.2. barriers to passivhaus, 5.2.1. increased costs and complications, 5.2.2. poor indoor air quality, 5.2.3. behavioural barriers, 5.2.4. market barriers, 5.2.5. regulatory barriers, 5.2.6. financial barriers, 6. conclusions, supplementary materials, author contributions, institutional review board statement, informed consent statement, data availability statement, acknowledgments, conflicts of interest.

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Panchalingam, K.; Rasheed, E.O.; Rotimi, J.O.B. Cost-Related Drivers and Barriers of Passivhaus: A Systematic Literature Review. Sustainability 2024 , 16 , 6510. https://doi.org/10.3390/su16156510

Panchalingam K, Rasheed EO, Rotimi JOB. Cost-Related Drivers and Barriers of Passivhaus: A Systematic Literature Review. Sustainability . 2024; 16(15):6510. https://doi.org/10.3390/su16156510

Panchalingam, Kajavathani, Eziaku Onyeizu Rasheed, and James Olabode Bamidele Rotimi. 2024. "Cost-Related Drivers and Barriers of Passivhaus: A Systematic Literature Review" Sustainability 16, no. 15: 6510. https://doi.org/10.3390/su16156510

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Smart technologies and textiles and their potential use and application in the care and support of elderly individuals: A systematic review

• Kruse, Karina
• Sauerwein, Wolfgang
• Lübben, Jörn
• Dodel, Richard

Demographic change is causing society to age. At the same time, technological progress is changing the way ageing individuals are cared for and medically treated. Several smart wearables and garments have recently been developed for this purpose. Based on previous research, we see a research gap in the use of smart clothing in the care and support of elderly people, especially with regard to concrete application potentials and example products. The aim of this study was to provide an overview of the latest studies and developments in smart clothing with a focus on usability and acceptance for an elderly individuals. A systematic literature search was performed in five databases using a predefined set of keyword. A total of 169 articles published between 1/2000 and 2/2023 were identified and assessed. The literature search followed a previously prepared research protocol according to the criteria of a systematic literature search. The research field of smart clothing is expanding with smart shirts being a major focus; however other products are also being investigated, each with specific capabilities. In particular, vital parameters are constantly optimized; representative products are described and assessed according to their potential applicability to elderly people. The future applications of smart clothing in health care are promising. Many studies on basic applications of smart textiles have been done, and some studies have already involved older people. Furthermore, newly developed suggestions for possible categorizations of smart wearables as well as smart clothing as a subtype are presented based on the researched literature. We found an overall positive impression of the development and application of smart clothing, especially in geriatric settings. However, aspects such as data collection, skin compatibility, wearing comfort, and integration of geriatric factors into known acceptance models need further investigation. Over the last two decades, there have been many developments in the field of smart clothing. For the care and support of elderly people, smart clothing is an important development with great potential. Continued advancement in these products is needed to adequately address the special needs of older people.

• smart textiles;
• wearable technology;
• technology acceptance;
• smart shirt;
• elderly care;
• vital sign monitoring;