What is Literature Review ?

According to UNC College of Arts & Science (2012) literature review discusses the published information on a particular subject area or can include information of a certain subject belonging to a specific time period.  As stated by University of Canberra (2012) the world "literature" covers all the material published on a specific subject, such as: books, journals, newspapers, government reports, theses etc. Literature reviews are simply used as the foundation when conducting an research, simply if you are out of time for research literature review can be used as a stepping stone (UNC College of Arts & Science, 2012).

Key features of a Literature Review (University of Nottingham Student Services, 2012):

• Breath 
• Depth 
• Clarity
• Brevity 
• Consistency 
• Effective analysis 
• Effective synthesis   

University of Queens Library (2005) shows the purpose the of literature review as follows;

• Provide a context for the research  
• Justify the research  
• Ensure the research hasn't been done before (or that it is not just a "replication study")  
• Show where the research fits into the existing body of knowledge  
• Enable the researcher to learn from previous theory on the subject  
• Illustrate how the subject has been studied previously  
• Highlight flaws in previous research  
• Outline gaps in previous research  
• Show that the work is adding to the understanding and knowledge of the field  
• Help refine, refocus or even change the topic  

Types of literature reviews;

• Primary sources, scholarly works
• Chapters in a theses or dissertation
• Explicit section in a grant or research proposal
• Explicit section in a research report
• Full length, stand alone review article

Author understands that literature review is one of the most important section in a research papers, its more like a foundation before conducting a research. It should be up to the point does not contain any junk material. Simply it should not be a laundry list or an annotated  bibliography. Before writing the literature review the information or data found should filtered and sorted accordingly, and then a particular structure should be followed when writing.    

References

Canberra.edu.au (2012) Writing a Literature Review : Academic Skills Centre : University of Canberra. [online] Available at: http://www.canberra.edu.au/studyskills/writing/literature [Accessed: 1 Dec 2012].

University of North Carolina (2012) Literature Reviews. [online] Available at: http://ritingcenter.unc.edu/handouts/literature-reviews/ [Accessed: 1 Dec 2012].

University of Nottingham Academic Support (2012) Doing a literature review: Using your working bibliography to structure a  literature review. [online] Available at: http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/studentservices/documents/adviceondoingaliteraturereview.pdf [Accessed: 1 Dec 2012].

University of Queens Library (2005) Purpose of the Literature Review. [online] Available at: http://library.queensu.ca/webedu/grad/Purpose_of_the_Literature_Review.pdf [Accessed: 1 Dec 2012].