what are the important of literature review in research

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Literature Reviews

• What is a literature review?
• Steps in the Literature Review Process
• Define your research question
• Determine inclusion and exclusion criteria
• Choose databases and search
• Review Results
• Synthesize Results
• Analyze Results
• Librarian Support

What is a Literature Review?

A literature or narrative review is a comprehensive review and analysis of the published literature on a specific topic or research question. The literature that is reviewed contains: books, articles, academic articles, conference proceedings, association papers, and dissertations. It contains the most pertinent studies and points to important past and current research and practices. It provides background and context, and shows how your research will contribute to the field. 

A literature review should: 

• Provide a comprehensive and updated review of the literature;
• Explain why this review has taken place;
• Articulate a position or hypothesis;
• Acknowledge and account for conflicting and corroborating points of view

From  S age Research Methods

Purpose of a Literature Review

A literature review can be written as an introduction to a study to:

• Demonstrate how a study fills a gap in research
• Compare a study with other research that's been done

Or it can be a separate work (a research article on its own) which:

• Organizes or describes a topic
• Describes variables within a particular issue/problem

Limitations of a Literature Review

Some of the limitations of a literature review are:

• It's a snapshot in time. Unlike other reviews, this one has beginning, a middle and an end. There may be future developments that could make your work less relevant.
• It may be too focused. Some niche studies may miss the bigger picture.
• It can be difficult to be comprehensive. There is no way to make sure all the literature on a topic was considered.
• It is easy to be biased if you stick to top tier journals. There may be other places where people are publishing exemplary research. Look to open access publications and conferences to reflect a more inclusive collection. Also, make sure to include opposing views (and not just supporting evidence).

Source: Grant, Maria J., and Andrew Booth. “A Typology of Reviews: An Analysis of 14 Review Types and Associated Methodologies.” Health Information & Libraries Journal, vol. 26, no. 2, June 2009, pp. 91–108. Wiley Online Library, doi:10.1111/j.1471-1842.2009.00848.x.

Meryl Brodsky : Communication and Information Studies

Hannah Chapman Tripp : Biology, Neuroscience

Carolyn Cunningham : Human Development & Family Sciences, Psychology, Sociology

Larayne Dallas : Engineering

Janelle Hedstrom : Special Education, Curriculum & Instruction, Ed Leadership & Policy ​

Susan Macicak : Linguistics

Imelda Vetter : Dell Medical School

For help in other subject areas, please see the guide to library specialists by subject .

Periodically, UT Libraries runs a workshop covering the basics and library support for literature reviews. While we try to offer these once per academic year, we find providing the recording to be helpful to community members who have missed the session. Following is the most recent recording of the workshop, Conducting a Literature Review. To view the recording, a UT login is required.

• October 26, 2022 recording
• Last Updated: Oct 26, 2022 2:49 PM
• URL: https://guides.lib.utexas.edu/literaturereviews

• 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
• << Previous: Getting Started
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• Last Updated: Sep 21, 2022 2:16 PM
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Writing a Literature Review

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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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• 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.

Prevent plagiarism, run a free check.

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.

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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Literature reviews, what is a literature review, learning more about how to do a literature review.

• Planning the Review
• The Research Question
• Choosing Where to Search
• Organizing the Review
• Writing the Review

A literature review is a review and synthesis of existing research on a topic or research question. A literature review is meant to analyze the scholarly literature, make connections across writings and identify strengths, weaknesses, trends, and missing conversations. A literature review should address different aspects of a topic as it relates to your research question. A literature review goes beyond a description or summary of the literature you have read. 

• Sage Research Methods Core Collection This link opens in a new window SAGE Research Methods supports research at all levels by providing material to guide users through every step of the research process. SAGE Research Methods is the ultimate methods library with more than 1000 books, reference works, journal articles, and instructional videos by world-leading academics from across the social sciences, including the largest collection of qualitative methods books available online from any scholarly publisher. – Publisher

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Conducting a literature review: why do a literature review, why do a literature review.

• How To Find "The Literature"
• Found it -- Now What?

Besides the obvious reason for students -- because it is assigned! -- a literature review helps you explore the research that has come before you, to see how your research question has (or has not) already been addressed.

You identify:

• core research in the field
• experts in the subject area
• methodology you may want to use (or avoid)
• gaps in knowledge -- or where your research would fit in

It Also Helps You:

• Publish and share your findings
• Justify requests for grants and other funding
• Identify best practices to inform practice
• Set wider context for a program evaluation
• Compile information to support community organizing

Great brief overview, from NCSU

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• CAREER FEATURE
• 04 December 2020
• Correction 09 December 2020

How to write a superb literature review

Andy Tay is a freelance writer based in Singapore.

You can also search for this author in PubMed   Google Scholar

Literature reviews are important resources for scientists. They provide historical context for a field while offering opinions on its future trajectory. Creating them can provide inspiration for one’s own research, as well as some practice in writing. But few scientists are trained in how to write a review — or in what constitutes an excellent one. Even picking the appropriate software to use can be an involved decision (see ‘Tools and techniques’). So Nature asked editors and working scientists with well-cited reviews for their tips.

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doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-020-03422-x

Interviews have been edited for length and clarity.

Updates & Corrections

Correction 09 December 2020 : An earlier version of the tables in this article included some incorrect details about the programs Zotero, Endnote and Manubot. These have now been corrected.

Hsing, I.-M., Xu, Y. & Zhao, W. Electroanalysis 19 , 755–768 (2007).

Article   Google Scholar  

Ledesma, H. A. et al. Nature Nanotechnol. 14 , 645–657 (2019).

Article   PubMed   Google Scholar  

Brahlek, M., Koirala, N., Bansal, N. & Oh, S. Solid State Commun. 215–216 , 54–62 (2015).

Choi, Y. & Lee, S. Y. Nature Rev. Chem . https://doi.org/10.1038/s41570-020-00221-w (2020).

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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 .

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16 Comments

Thanks for this review. It narrates what’s not been taught as tutors are always in a early to finish their classes.

Thanks for the kind words, Becky. Good luck with your literature review 🙂

This website is amazing, it really helps break everything down. Thank you, I would have been lost without it.

This is review is amazing. I benefited from it a lot and hope others visiting this website will benefit too.

Timothy T. Chol [email protected]

Thank you very much for the guiding in literature review I learn and benefited a lot this make my journey smooth I’ll recommend this site to my friends

This was so useful. Thank you so much.

Hi, Concept was explained nicely by both of you. Thanks a lot for sharing it. It will surely help research scholars to start their Research Journey.

The review is really helpful to me especially during this period of covid-19 pandemic when most universities in my country only offer online classes. Great stuff

Great Brief Explanation, thanks

So helpful to me as a student

GradCoach is a fantastic site with brilliant and modern minds behind it.. I spent weeks decoding the substantial academic Jargon and grounding my initial steps on the research process, which could be shortened to a couple of days through the Gradcoach. Thanks again!

This is an amazing talk. I paved way for myself as a researcher. Thank you GradCoach!

Well-presented overview of the literature!

This was brilliant. So clear. Thank you

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What is the Purpose of a Literature Review?

4-minute read

• 23rd October 2023

If you’re writing a research paper or dissertation , then you’ll most likely need to include a comprehensive literature review . In this post, we’ll review the purpose of literature reviews, why they are so significant, and the specific elements to include in one. Literature reviews can:

1. Provide a foundation for current research.

2. Define key concepts and theories.

3. Demonstrate critical evaluation.

4. Show how research and methodologies have evolved.

5. Identify gaps in existing research.

6. Support your argument.

Keep reading to enter the exciting world of literature reviews!

What is a Literature Review?

A literature review is a critical summary and evaluation of the existing research (e.g., academic journal articles and books) on a specific topic. It is typically included as a separate section or chapter of a research paper or dissertation, serving as a contextual framework for a study. Literature reviews can vary in length depending on the subject and nature of the study, with most being about equal length to other sections or chapters included in the paper. Essentially, the literature review highlights previous studies in the context of your research and summarizes your insights in a structured, organized format. Next, let’s look at the overall purpose of a literature review.

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Literature reviews are considered an integral part of research across most academic subjects and fields. The primary purpose of a literature review in your study is to:

Provide a Foundation for Current Research

Since the literature review provides a comprehensive evaluation of the existing research, it serves as a solid foundation for your current study. It’s a way to contextualize your work and show how your research fits into the broader landscape of your specific area of study.  

Define Key Concepts and Theories

The literature review highlights the central theories and concepts that have arisen from previous research on your chosen topic. It gives your readers a more thorough understanding of the background of your study and why your research is particularly significant .

Demonstrate Critical Evaluation 

A comprehensive literature review shows your ability to critically analyze and evaluate a broad range of source material. And since you’re considering and acknowledging the contribution of key scholars alongside your own, it establishes your own credibility and knowledge.

Show How Research and Methodologies Have Evolved

Another purpose of literature reviews is to provide a historical perspective and demonstrate how research and methodologies have changed over time, especially as data collection methods and technology have advanced. And studying past methodologies allows you, as the researcher, to understand what did and did not work and apply that knowledge to your own research.  

Identify Gaps in Existing Research

Besides discussing current research and methodologies, the literature review should also address areas that are lacking in the existing literature. This helps further demonstrate the relevance of your own research by explaining why your study is necessary to fill the gaps.

Support Your Argument

A good literature review should provide evidence that supports your research questions and hypothesis. For example, your study may show that your research supports existing theories or builds on them in some way. Referencing previous related studies shows your work is grounded in established research and will ultimately be a contribution to the field.  

Literature Review Editing Services 

Ensure your literature review is polished and ready for submission by having it professionally proofread and edited by our expert team. Our literature review editing services will help your research stand out and make an impact. Not convinced yet? Send in your free sample today and see for yourself! 

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Literature Reviews

• Getting started

What is a literature review?

Why conduct a literature review, stages of a literature review, lit reviews: an overview (video), check out these books.

• Types of reviews
• 1. Define your research question
• 2. Plan your search
• 3. Search the literature
• 4. Organize your results
• 5. Synthesize your findings
• 6. Write the review
• Artificial intelligence (AI) tools
• Thompson Writing Studio This link opens in a new window
• Need to write a systematic review? This link opens in a new window

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Definition: A literature review is a systematic examination and synthesis of existing scholarly research on a specific topic or subject.

Purpose: It serves to provide a comprehensive overview of the current state of knowledge within a particular field.

Analysis: Involves critically evaluating and summarizing key findings, methodologies, and debates found in academic literature.

Identifying Gaps: Aims to pinpoint areas where there is a lack of research or unresolved questions, highlighting opportunities for further investigation.

Contextualization: Enables researchers to understand how their work fits into the broader academic conversation and contributes to the existing body of knowledge.

tl;dr  A literature review critically examines and synthesizes existing scholarly research and publications on a specific topic to provide a comprehensive understanding of the current state of knowledge in the field.

What is a literature review NOT?

❌ An annotated bibliography

❌ Original research

❌ A summary

❌ Something to be conducted at the end of your research

❌ An opinion piece

❌ A chronological compilation of studies

The reason for conducting a literature review is to:

Literature Reviews: An Overview for Graduate Students

While this 9-minute video from NCSU is geared toward graduate students, it is useful for anyone conducting a literature review.

Writing the literature review: A practical guide

Available 3rd floor of Perkins

Writing literature reviews: A guide for students of the social and behavioral sciences

Available online!

So, you have to write a literature review: A guided workbook for engineers

Telling a research story: Writing a literature review

The literature review: Six steps to success

Systematic approaches to a successful literature review

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Research Methods

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• Literature Review Research
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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: Aug 21, 2023 4:07 PM
• URL: https://guides.lib.udel.edu/researchmethods

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What is a Literature Review? How to Write It (with Examples)

A literature review is a critical analysis and synthesis of existing research on a particular topic. It provides an overview of the current state of knowledge, identifies gaps, and highlights key findings in the literature. 1 The purpose of a literature review is to situate your own research within the context of existing scholarship, demonstrating your understanding of the topic and showing how your work contributes to the ongoing conversation in the field. Learning how to write a literature review is a critical tool for successful research. Your ability to summarize and synthesize prior research pertaining to a certain topic demonstrates your grasp on the topic of study, and assists in the learning process. 

Table of Contents

• What is the purpose of literature review? 
• a. Habitat Loss and Species Extinction: 
• b. Range Shifts and Phenological Changes: 
• c. Ocean Acidification and Coral Reefs: 
• d. Adaptive Strategies and Conservation Efforts: 

How to write a good literature review 

• Choose a Topic and Define the Research Question: 
• Decide on the Scope of Your Review: 
• Select Databases for Searches: 
• Conduct Searches and Keep Track: 
• Review the Literature: 
• Organize and Write Your Literature Review: 
• How to write a literature review faster with Paperpal? 
• Frequently asked questions 

What is a literature review?

A well-conducted literature review demonstrates the researcher’s familiarity with the existing literature, establishes the context for their own research, and contributes to scholarly conversations on the topic. One of the purposes of a literature review is also to help researchers avoid duplicating previous work and ensure that their research is informed by and builds upon the existing body of knowledge.

What is the purpose of literature review?

A literature review serves several important purposes within academic and research contexts. Here are some key objectives and functions of a literature review: 2  

1. Contextualizing the Research Problem: The literature review provides a background and context for the research problem under investigation. It helps to situate the study within the existing body of knowledge. 

2. Identifying Gaps in Knowledge: By identifying gaps, contradictions, or areas requiring further research, the researcher can shape the research question and justify the significance of the study. This is crucial for ensuring that the new research contributes something novel to the field. 

Find academic papers related to your research topic faster. Try Research on Paperpal  

3. Understanding Theoretical and Conceptual Frameworks: Literature reviews help researchers gain an understanding of the theoretical and conceptual frameworks used in previous studies. This aids in the development of a theoretical framework for the current research. 

4. Providing Methodological Insights: Another purpose of literature reviews is that it allows researchers to learn about the methodologies employed in previous studies. This can help in choosing appropriate research methods for the current study and avoiding pitfalls that others may have encountered. 

5. Establishing Credibility: A well-conducted literature review demonstrates the researcher’s familiarity with existing scholarship, establishing their credibility and expertise in the field. It also helps in building a solid foundation for the new research. 

6. Informing Hypotheses or Research Questions: The literature review guides the formulation of hypotheses or research questions by highlighting relevant findings and areas of uncertainty in existing literature. 

Literature review example

Let’s delve deeper with a literature review example: Let’s say your literature review is about the impact of climate change on biodiversity. You might format your literature review into sections such as the effects of climate change on habitat loss and species extinction, phenological changes, and marine biodiversity. Each section would then summarize and analyze relevant studies in those areas, highlighting key findings and identifying gaps in the research. The review would conclude by emphasizing the need for further research on specific aspects of the relationship between climate change and biodiversity. The following literature review template provides a glimpse into the recommended literature review structure and content, demonstrating how research findings are organized around specific themes within a broader topic. 

Literature Review on Climate Change Impacts on Biodiversity:

Climate change is a global phenomenon with far-reaching consequences, including significant impacts on biodiversity. This literature review synthesizes key findings from various studies: 

a. Habitat Loss and Species Extinction:

Climate change-induced alterations in temperature and precipitation patterns contribute to habitat loss, affecting numerous species (Thomas et al., 2004). The review discusses how these changes increase the risk of extinction, particularly for species with specific habitat requirements. 

b. Range Shifts and Phenological Changes:

Observations of range shifts and changes in the timing of biological events (phenology) are documented in response to changing climatic conditions (Parmesan & Yohe, 2003). These shifts affect ecosystems and may lead to mismatches between species and their resources. 

c. Ocean Acidification and Coral Reefs:

The review explores the impact of climate change on marine biodiversity, emphasizing ocean acidification’s threat to coral reefs (Hoegh-Guldberg et al., 2007). Changes in pH levels negatively affect coral calcification, disrupting the delicate balance of marine ecosystems. 

d. Adaptive Strategies and Conservation Efforts:

Recognizing the urgency of the situation, the literature review discusses various adaptive strategies adopted by species and conservation efforts aimed at mitigating the impacts of climate change on biodiversity (Hannah et al., 2007). It emphasizes the importance of interdisciplinary approaches for effective conservation planning. 

Strengthen your literature review with factual insights. Try Research on Paperpal for free!    

Writing a literature review involves summarizing and synthesizing existing research on a particular topic. A good literature review format should include the following elements. 

Introduction: The introduction sets the stage for your literature review, providing context and introducing the main focus of your review. 

• Opening Statement: Begin with a general statement about the broader topic and its significance in the field. 
• Scope and Purpose: Clearly define the scope of your literature review. Explain the specific research question or objective you aim to address. 
• Organizational Framework: Briefly outline the structure of your literature review, indicating how you will categorize and discuss the existing research. 
• Significance of the Study: Highlight why your literature review is important and how it contributes to the understanding of the chosen topic. 
• Thesis Statement: Conclude the introduction with a concise thesis statement that outlines the main argument or perspective you will develop in the body of the literature review. 

Body: The body of the literature review is where you provide a comprehensive analysis of existing literature, grouping studies based on themes, methodologies, or other relevant criteria. 

• Organize by Theme or Concept: Group studies that share common themes, concepts, or methodologies. Discuss each theme or concept in detail, summarizing key findings and identifying gaps or areas of disagreement. 
• Critical Analysis: Evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of each study. Discuss the methodologies used, the quality of evidence, and the overall contribution of each work to the understanding of the topic. 
• Synthesis of Findings: Synthesize the information from different studies to highlight trends, patterns, or areas of consensus in the literature. 
• Identification of Gaps: Discuss any gaps or limitations in the existing research and explain how your review contributes to filling these gaps. 
• Transition between Sections: Provide smooth transitions between different themes or concepts to maintain the flow of your literature review. 

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Conclusion: The conclusion of your literature review should summarize the main findings, highlight the contributions of the review, and suggest avenues for future research. 

• Summary of Key Findings: Recap the main findings from the literature and restate how they contribute to your research question or objective. 
• Contributions to the Field: Discuss the overall contribution of your literature review to the existing knowledge in the field. 
• Implications and Applications: Explore the practical implications of the findings and suggest how they might impact future research or practice. 
• Recommendations for Future Research: Identify areas that require further investigation and propose potential directions for future research in the field. 
• Final Thoughts: Conclude with a final reflection on the importance of your literature review and its relevance to the broader academic community. 

Conducting a literature review

Conducting a literature review is an essential step in research that involves reviewing and analyzing existing literature on a specific topic. It’s important to know how to do a literature review effectively, so here are the steps to follow: 1  

Choose a Topic and Define the Research Question:

• Select a topic that is relevant to your field of study. 
• Clearly define your research question or objective. Determine what specific aspect of the topic do you want to explore? 

Decide on the Scope of Your Review:

• Determine the timeframe for your literature review. Are you focusing on recent developments, or do you want a historical overview? 
• Consider the geographical scope. Is your review global, or are you focusing on a specific region? 
• Define the inclusion and exclusion criteria. What types of sources will you include? Are there specific types of studies or publications you will exclude? 

Select Databases for Searches:

• Identify relevant databases for your field. Examples include PubMed, IEEE Xplore, Scopus, Web of Science, and Google Scholar. 
• Consider searching in library catalogs, institutional repositories, and specialized databases related to your topic. 

Conduct Searches and Keep Track:

• Develop a systematic search strategy using keywords, Boolean operators (AND, OR, NOT), and other search techniques. 
• Record and document your search strategy for transparency and replicability. 
• Keep track of the articles, including publication details, abstracts, and links. Use citation management tools like EndNote, Zotero, or Mendeley to organize your references. 

Review the Literature:

• Evaluate the relevance and quality of each source. Consider the methodology, sample size, and results of studies. 
• Organize the literature by themes or key concepts. Identify patterns, trends, and gaps in the existing research. 
• Summarize key findings and arguments from each source. Compare and contrast different perspectives. 
• Identify areas where there is a consensus in the literature and where there are conflicting opinions. 
• Provide critical analysis and synthesis of the literature. What are the strengths and weaknesses of existing research? 

Organize and Write Your Literature Review:

• Literature review outline should be based on themes, chronological order, or methodological approaches. 
• Write a clear and coherent narrative that synthesizes the information gathered. 
• Use proper citations for each source and ensure consistency in your citation style (APA, MLA, Chicago, etc.). 
• Conclude your literature review by summarizing key findings, identifying gaps, and suggesting areas for future research. 

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Frequently asked questions

A literature review is a critical and comprehensive analysis of existing literature (published and unpublished works) on a specific topic or research question and provides a synthesis of the current state of knowledge in a particular field. A well-conducted literature review is crucial for researchers to build upon existing knowledge, avoid duplication of efforts, and contribute to the advancement of their field. It also helps researchers situate their work within a broader context and facilitates the development of a sound theoretical and conceptual framework for their studies.

Literature review is a crucial component of research writing, providing a solid background for a research paper’s investigation. The aim is to keep professionals up to date by providing an understanding of ongoing developments within a specific field, including research methods, and experimental techniques used in that field, and present that knowledge in the form of a written report. Also, the depth and breadth of the literature review emphasizes the credibility of the scholar in his or her field.  

Before writing a literature review, it’s essential to undertake several preparatory steps to ensure that your review is well-researched, organized, and focused. This includes choosing a topic of general interest to you and doing exploratory research on that topic, writing an annotated bibliography, and noting major points, especially those that relate to the position you have taken on the topic. 

Literature reviews and academic research papers are essential components of scholarly work but serve different purposes within the academic realm. 3 A literature review aims to provide a foundation for understanding the current state of research on a particular topic, identify gaps or controversies, and lay the groundwork for future research. Therefore, it draws heavily from existing academic sources, including books, journal articles, and other scholarly publications. In contrast, an academic research paper aims to present new knowledge, contribute to the academic discourse, and advance the understanding of a specific research question. Therefore, it involves a mix of existing literature (in the introduction and literature review sections) and original data or findings obtained through research methods. 

Literature reviews are essential components of academic and research papers, and various strategies can be employed to conduct them effectively. If you want to know how to write a literature review for a research paper, here are four common approaches that are often used by researchers.  Chronological Review: This strategy involves organizing the literature based on the chronological order of publication. It helps to trace the development of a topic over time, showing how ideas, theories, and research have evolved.  Thematic Review: Thematic reviews focus on identifying and analyzing themes or topics that cut across different studies. Instead of organizing the literature chronologically, it is grouped by key themes or concepts, allowing for a comprehensive exploration of various aspects of the topic.  Methodological Review: This strategy involves organizing the literature based on the research methods employed in different studies. It helps to highlight the strengths and weaknesses of various methodologies and allows the reader to evaluate the reliability and validity of the research findings.  Theoretical Review: A theoretical review examines the literature based on the theoretical frameworks used in different studies. This approach helps to identify the key theories that have been applied to the topic and assess their contributions to the understanding of the subject.  It’s important to note that these strategies are not mutually exclusive, and a literature review may combine elements of more than one approach. The choice of strategy depends on the research question, the nature of the literature available, and the goals of the review. Additionally, other strategies, such as integrative reviews or systematic reviews, may be employed depending on the specific requirements of the research.

The literature review format can vary depending on the specific publication guidelines. However, there are some common elements and structures that are often followed. Here is a general guideline for the format of a literature review:  Introduction:   Provide an overview of the topic.  Define the scope and purpose of the literature review.  State the research question or objective.  Body:   Organize the literature by themes, concepts, or chronology.  Critically analyze and evaluate each source.  Discuss the strengths and weaknesses of the studies.  Highlight any methodological limitations or biases.  Identify patterns, connections, or contradictions in the existing research.  Conclusion:   Summarize the key points discussed in the literature review.  Highlight the research gap.  Address the research question or objective stated in the introduction.  Highlight the contributions of the review and suggest directions for future research.

Both annotated bibliographies and literature reviews involve the examination of scholarly sources. While annotated bibliographies focus on individual sources with brief annotations, literature reviews provide a more in-depth, integrated, and comprehensive analysis of existing literature on a specific topic. The key differences are as follows: 

References 

• Denney, A. S., & Tewksbury, R. (2013). How to write a literature review.  Journal of criminal justice education ,  24 (2), 218-234. 
• Pan, M. L. (2016).  Preparing literature reviews: Qualitative and quantitative approaches . Taylor & Francis. 
• Cantero, C. (2019). How to write a literature review.  San José State University Writing Center . 

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A Guide to Literature Reviews

Importance of a good literature review.

• Conducting the Literature Review
• Structure and Writing Style
• Types of Literature Reviews
• Citation Management Software This link opens in a new window
• Acknowledgements

A literature review is not only a summary of key sources, but  has an organizational pattern which 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.

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].
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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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What is a literature review?

A literature review is an integrated analysis -- not just a summary-- of scholarly writings and other relevant evidence related directly to your research question.  That is, it represents a synthesis of the evidence that provides background information on your topic and shows a association between the evidence and your research question.

A literature review may be a stand alone work or the introduction to a larger research paper, depending on the assignment.  Rely heavily on the guidelines your instructor has given you.

Why is it important?

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.
• Discovers relationships between research studies/ideas.
• Identifies major themes, concepts, and researchers on a topic.
• Identifies critical gaps and points of disagreement.
• Discusses further research questions that logically come out of the previous studies.

APA7 Style resources

APA Style Blog - for those harder to find answers

1. Choose a topic. Define your research question.

Your literature review should be guided by your central research question.  The literature represents background and research developments related to a specific research question, interpreted and analyzed by you in a synthesized way.

• Make sure your research question is not too broad or too narrow.  Is it manageable?
• Begin writing down terms that are related to your question. These will be useful for searches later.
• If you have the opportunity, discuss your topic with your professor and your class mates.

2. Decide on the scope of your review

How many studies do you need to look at? How comprehensive should it be? How many years should it cover? 

• This may depend on your assignment.  How many sources does the assignment require?

3. Select the databases you will use to conduct your searches.

Make a list of the databases you will search. 

Where to find databases:

• use the tabs on this guide
• Find other databases in the Nursing Information Resources web page
• More on the Medical Library web page
• ... and more on the Yale University Library web page

4. Conduct your searches to find the evidence. Keep track of your searches.

• Use the key words in your question, as well as synonyms for those words, as terms in your search. Use the database tutorials for help.
• Save the searches in the databases. This saves time when you want to redo, or modify, the searches. It is also helpful to use as a guide is the searches are not finding any useful results.
• Review the abstracts of research studies carefully. This will save you time.
• Use the bibliographies and references of research studies you find to locate others.
• Check with your professor, or a subject expert in the field, if you are missing any key works in the field.
• Ask your librarian for help at any time.
• Use a citation manager, such as EndNote as the repository for your citations. See the EndNote tutorials for help.

Review the literature

Some questions to help you analyze the research:

• What was the research question of the study you are reviewing? What were the authors trying to discover?
• Was the research funded by a source that could influence the findings?
• What were the research methodologies? Analyze its literature review, the samples and variables used, the results, and the conclusions.
• Does the research seem to be complete? Could it have been conducted more soundly? What further questions does it raise?
• If there are conflicting studies, why do you think that is?
• How are the authors viewed in the field? Has this study been cited? If so, how has it been analyzed?

Tips: 

• Review the abstracts carefully.  
• Keep careful notes so that you may track your thought processes during the research process.
• Create a matrix of the studies for easy analysis, and synthesis, across all of the studies.
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Reviewing literature for research: Doing it the right way

Shital amin poojary.

Department of Dermatology, K J Somaiya Medical College, Mumbai, Maharashtra, India

Jimish Deepak Bagadia

In an era of information overload, it is important to know how to obtain the required information and also to ensure that it is reliable information. Hence, it is essential to understand how to perform a systematic literature search. This article focuses on reliable literature sources and how to make optimum use of these in dermatology and venereology.

INTRODUCTION

A thorough review of literature is not only essential for selecting research topics, but also enables the right applicability of a research project. Most importantly, a good literature search is the cornerstone of practice of evidence based medicine. Today, everything is available at the click of a mouse or at the tip of the fingertips (or the stylus). Google is often the Go-To search website, the supposed answer to all questions in the universe. However, the deluge of information available comes with its own set of problems; how much of it is actually reliable information? How much are the search results that the search string threw up actually relevant? Did we actually find what we were looking for? Lack of a systematic approach can lead to a literature review ending up as a time-consuming and at times frustrating process. Hence, whether it is for research projects, theses/dissertations, case studies/reports or mere wish to obtain information; knowing where to look, and more importantly, how to look, is of prime importance today.

Literature search

Fink has defined research literature review as a “systematic, explicit and reproducible method for identifying, evaluating, and synthesizing the existing body of completed and recorded work produced by researchers, scholars and practitioners.”[ 1 ]

Review of research literature can be summarized into a seven step process: (i) Selecting research questions/purpose of the literature review (ii) Selecting your sources (iii) Choosing search terms (iv) Running your search (v) Applying practical screening criteria (vi) Applying methodological screening criteria/quality appraisal (vii) Synthesizing the results.[ 1 ]

This article will primarily concentrate on refining techniques of literature search.

Sources for literature search are enumerated in Table 1 .

Sources for literature search

PubMed is currently the most widely used among these as it contains over 23 million citations for biomedical literature and has been made available free by National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI), U.S. National Library of Medicine. However, the availability of free full text articles depends on the sources. Use of options such as advanced search, medical subject headings (MeSH) terms, free full text, PubMed tutorials, and single citation matcher makes the database extremely user-friendly [ Figure 1 ]. It can also be accessed on the go through mobiles using “PubMed Mobile.” One can also create own account in NCBI to save searches and to use certain PubMed tools.

PubMed home page showing location of different tools which can be used for an efficient literature search

Tips for efficient use of PubMed search:[ 2 , 3 , 4 ]

Use of field and Boolean operators

When one searches using key words, all articles containing the words show up, many of which may not be related to the topic. Hence, the use of operators while searching makes the search more specific and less cumbersome. Operators are of two types: Field operators and Boolean operators, the latter enabling us to combine more than one concept, thereby making the search highly accurate. A few key operators that can be used in PubMed are shown in Tables ​ Tables2 2 and ​ and3 3 and illustrated in Figures ​ Figures2 2 and ​ and3 3 .

Field operators used in PubMed search

Boolean operators used in PubMed search

PubMed search results page showing articles on donovanosis using the field operator [TIAB]; it shows all articles which have the keyword “donovanosis” in either title or abstract of the article

PubMed search using Boolean operators ‘AND’, ‘NOT’; To search for articles on treatment of lepra reaction other than steroids, after clicking the option ‘Advanced search’ on the home page, one can build the search using ‘AND’ option for treatment and ‘NOT’ option for steroids to omit articles on steroid treatment in lepra reaction

Use of medical subject headings terms

These are very specific and standardized terms used by indexers to describe every article in PubMed and are added to the record of every article. A search using MeSH will show all articles about the topic (or keywords), but will not show articles only containing these keywords (these articles may be about an entirely different topic, but still may contain your keywords in another context in any part of the article). This will make your search more specific. Within the topic, specific subheadings can be added to the search builder to refine your search [ Figure 4 ]. For example, MeSH terms for treatment are therapy and therapeutics.

PubMed search using medical subject headings (MeSH) terms for management of gonorrhea. Click on MeSH database ( Figure 1 ) →In the MeSH search box type gonorrhea and click search. Under the MeSH term gonorrhea, there will be a list of subheadings; therapy, prevention and control, click the relevant check boxes and add to search builder →Click on search →All articles on therapy, prevention and control of gonorrhea will be displayed. Below the subheadings, there are two options: (1) Restrict to medical subject headings (MeSH) major topic and (2) do not include MeSH terms found below this term in the MeSH hierarchy. These can be used to further refine the search results so that only articles which are majorly about treatment of gonorrhea will be displayed

Two additional options can be used to further refine MeSH searches. These are located below the subheadings for a MeSH term: (1) Restrict to MeSH major topic; checking this box will retrieve articles which are majorly about the search term and are therefore, more focused and (2) Do not include MeSH terms found below this term in the MeSH hierarchy. This option will again give you more focused articles as it excludes the lower specific terms [ Figure 4 ].

Similar feature is available with Cochrane library (also called MeSH), EMBASE (known as EMTREE) and PsycINFO (Thesaurus of Psychological Index Terms).

Saving your searches

Any search that one has performed can be saved by using the ‘Send to’ option and can be saved as a simple word file [ Figure 5 ]. Alternatively, the ‘Save Search’ button (just below the search box) can be used. However, it is essential to set up an NCBI account and log in to NCBI for this. One can even choose to have E-mail updates of new articles in the topic of interest.

Saving PubMed searches. A simple option is to click on the dropdown box next to ‘Send to’ option and then choose among the options. It can be saved as a text or word file by choosing ‘File’ option. Another option is the “Save search” option below the search box but this will require logging into your National Center for Biotechnology Information account. This however allows you to set up alerts for E-mail updates for new articles

Single citation matcher

This is another important tool that helps to find the genuine original source of a particular research work (when few details are known about the title/author/publication date/place/journal) and cite the reference in the most correct manner [ Figure 6 ].

Single citation matcher: Click on “Single citation matcher” on PubMed Home page. Type available details of the required reference in the boxes to get the required citation

Full text articles

In any search clicking on the link “free full text” (if present) gives you free access to the article. In some instances, though the published article may not be available free, the author manuscript may be available free of charge. Furthermore, PubMed Central articles are available free of charge.

Managing filters

Filters can be used to refine a search according to type of article required or subjects of research. One can specify the type of article required such as clinical trial, reviews, free full text; these options are available on a typical search results page. Further specialized filters are available under “manage filters:” e.g., articles confined to certain age groups (properties option), “Links” to other databases, article specific to particular journals, etc. However, one needs to have an NCBI account and log in to access this option [ Figure 7 ].

Managing filters. Simple filters are available on the ‘search results’ page. One can choose type of article, e.g., clinical trial, reviews etc. Further options are available in the “Manage filters” option, but this requires logging into National Center for Biotechnology Information account

The Cochrane library

Although reviews are available in PubMed, for systematic reviews and meta-analysis, Cochrane library is a much better resource. The Cochrane library is a collection of full length systematic reviews, which can be accessed for free in India, thanks to Indian Council of Medical Research renewing the license up to 2016, benefitting users all over India. It is immensely helpful in finding detailed high quality research work done in a particular field/topic [ Figure 8 ].

Cochrane library is a useful resource for reliable, systematic reviews. One can choose the type of reviews required, including trials

An important tool that must be used while searching for research work is screening. Screening helps to improve the accuracy of search results. It is of two types: (1) Practical: To identify a broad range of potentially useful studies. Examples: Date of publication (last 5 years only; gives you most recent updates), participants or subjects (humans above 18 years), publication language (English only) (2) methodological: To identify best available studies (for example, excluding studies not involving control group or studies with only randomized control trials).

Selecting the right quality of literature is the key to successful research literature review. The quality can be estimated by what is known as “The Evidence Pyramid.” The level of evidence of references obtained from the aforementioned search tools are depicted in Figure 9 . Systematic reviews obtained from Cochrane library constitute level 1 evidence.

Evidence pyramid: Depicting the level of evidence of references obtained from the aforementioned search tools

Thus, a systematic literature review can help not only in setting up the basis of a good research with optimal use of available information, but also in practice of evidence-based medicine.

Source of Support: Nil.

Conflict of Interest: None declared.

• Research Process

Literature Review in Research Writing

• 4 minute read
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Table of Contents

Research on research? If you find this idea rather peculiar, know that nowadays, with the huge amount of information produced daily all around the world, it is becoming more and more difficult to keep up to date with all of it. In addition to the sheer amount of research, there is also its origin. We are witnessing the economic and intellectual emergence of countries like China, Brazil, Turkey, and United Arab Emirates, for example, that are producing scholarly literature in their own languages. So, apart from the effort of gathering information, there must also be translators prepared to unify all of it in a single language to be the object of the literature survey. At Elsevier, our team of translators is ready to support researchers by delivering high-quality scientific translations , in several languages, to serve their research – no matter the topic.

What is a literature review?

A literature review is a study – or, more accurately, a survey – involving scholarly material, with the aim to discuss published information about a specific topic or research question. Therefore, to write a literature review, it is compulsory that you are a real expert in the object of study. The results and findings will be published and made available to the public, namely scientists working in the same area of research.

How to Write a Literature Review

First of all, don’t forget that writing a literature review is a great responsibility. It’s a document that is expected to be highly reliable, especially concerning its sources and findings. You have to feel intellectually comfortable in the area of study and highly proficient in the target language; misconceptions and errors do not have a place in a document as important as a literature review. In fact, you might want to consider text editing services, like those offered at Elsevier, to make sure your literature is following the highest standards of text quality. You want to make sure your literature review is memorable by its novelty and quality rather than language errors.

Writing a literature review requires expertise but also organization. We cannot teach you about your topic of research, but we can provide a few steps to guide you through conducting a literature review:

• Choose your topic or research question: It should not be too comprehensive or too limited. You have to complete your task within a feasible time frame.
• Set the scope: Define boundaries concerning the number of sources, time frame to be covered, geographical area, etc.
• Decide which databases you will use for your searches: In order to search the best viable sources for your literature review, use highly regarded, comprehensive databases to get a big picture of the literature related to your topic.
• Search, search, and search: Now you’ll start to investigate the research on your topic. It’s critical that you keep track of all the sources. Start by looking at research abstracts in detail to see if their respective studies relate to or are useful for your own work. Next, search for bibliographies and references that can help you broaden your list of resources. Choose the most relevant literature and remember to keep notes of their bibliographic references to be used later on.
• Review all the literature, appraising carefully it’s content: After reading the study’s abstract, pay attention to the rest of the content of the articles you deem the “most relevant.” Identify methodologies, the most important questions they address, if they are well-designed and executed, and if they are cited enough, etc.

If it’s the first time you’ve published a literature review, note that it is important to follow a special structure. Just like in a thesis, for example, it is expected that you have an introduction – giving the general idea of the central topic and organizational pattern – a body – which contains the actual discussion of the sources – and finally the conclusion or recommendations – where you bring forward whatever you have drawn from the reviewed literature. The conclusion may even suggest there are no agreeable findings and that the discussion should be continued.

Why are literature reviews important?

Literature reviews constantly feed new research, that constantly feeds literature reviews…and we could go on and on. The fact is, one acts like a force over the other and this is what makes science, as a global discipline, constantly develop and evolve. As a scientist, writing a literature review can be very beneficial to your career, and set you apart from the expert elite in your field of interest. But it also can be an overwhelming task, so don’t hesitate in contacting Elsevier for text editing services, either for profound edition or just a last revision. We guarantee the very highest standards. You can also save time by letting us suggest and make the necessary amendments to your manuscript, so that it fits the structural pattern of a literature review. Who knows how many worldwide researchers you will impact with your next perfectly written literature review.

Know more: How to Find a Gap in Research .

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 “A substantive, thorough, sophisticated literature review is a precondition for doing substantive, thorough, sophisticated research”. Boote and Baile 2005

Authors of manuscripts treat writing a literature review as a routine work or a mere formality. But a seasoned one knows the purpose and importance of a well-written literature review.  Since it is one of the basic needs for researches at any level, they have to be done vigilantly. Only then the reader will know that the basics of research have not been neglected.

The aim of any literature review is to summarize and synthesize the arguments and ideas of existing knowledge in a particular field without adding any new contributions.   Being built on existing knowledge they help the researcher to even turn the wheels of the topic of research.  It is possible only with profound knowledge of what is wrong in the existing findings in detail to overpower them.  For other researches, the literature review gives the direction to be headed for its success. 

The common perception of literature review and reality:

As per the common belief, literature reviews are only a summary of the sources related to the research. And many authors of scientific manuscripts believe that they are only surveys of what are the researches are done on the chosen topic.  But on the contrary, it uses published information from pertinent and relevant sources like

• Scholarly books
• Scientific papers
• Latest studies in the field
• Established school of thoughts
• Relevant articles from renowned scientific journals

and many more for a field of study or theory or a particular problem to do the following:

• Summarize into a brief account of all information
• Synthesize the information by restructuring and reorganizing
• Critical evaluation of a concept or a school of thought or ideas
• Familiarize the authors to the extent of knowledge in the particular field
• Encapsulate
• Compare & contrast

By doing the above on the relevant information, it provides the reader of the scientific manuscript with the following for a better understanding of it:

• It establishes the authors’  in-depth understanding and knowledge of their field subject
• It gives the background of the research
• Portrays the scientific manuscript plan of examining the research result
• Illuminates on how the knowledge has changed within the field
• Highlights what has already been done in a particular field
• Information of the generally accepted facts, emerging and current state of the topic of research
• Identifies the research gap that is still unexplored or under-researched fields
• Demonstrates how the research fits within a larger field of study
• Provides an overview of the sources explored during the research of a particular topic

Importance of literature review in research:

The importance of literature review in scientific manuscripts can be condensed into an analytical feature to enable the multifold reach of its significance.  It adds value to the legitimacy of the research in many ways:

• Provides the interpretation of existing literature in light of updated developments in the field to help in establishing the consistency in knowledge and relevancy of existing materials
• It helps in calculating the impact of the latest information in the field by mapping their progress of knowledge.
• It brings out the dialects of contradictions between various thoughts within the field to establish facts
• The research gaps scrutinized initially are further explored to establish the latest facts of theories to add value to the field
• Indicates the current research place in the schema of a particular field
• Provides information for relevancy and coherency to check the research
• Apart from elucidating the continuance of knowledge, it also points out areas that require further investigation and thus aid as a starting point of any future research
• Justifies the research and sets up the research question
• Sets up a theoretical framework comprising the concepts and theories of the research upon which its success can be judged
• Helps to adopt a more appropriate methodology for the research by examining the strengths and weaknesses of existing research in the same field
• Increases the significance of the results by comparing it with the existing literature
• Provides a point of reference by writing the findings in the scientific manuscript
• Helps to get the due credit from the audience for having done the fact-finding and fact-checking mission in the scientific manuscripts
• The more the reference of relevant sources of it could increase more of its trustworthiness with the readers
• Helps to prevent plagiarism by tailoring and uniquely tweaking the scientific manuscript not to repeat other’s original idea
• By preventing plagiarism , it saves the scientific manuscript from rejection and thus also saves a lot of time and money
• Helps to evaluate, condense and synthesize gist in the author’s own words to sharpen the research focus
• Helps to compare and contrast to  show the originality and uniqueness of the research than that of the existing other researches
• Rationalizes the need for conducting the particular research in a specified field
• Helps to collect data accurately for allowing any new methodology of research than the existing ones
• Enables the readers of the manuscript to answer the following questions of its readers for its better chances for publication
• What do the researchers know?
• What do they not know?
• Is the scientific manuscript reliable and trustworthy?
• What are the knowledge gaps of the researcher?

22. It helps the readers to identify the following for further reading of the scientific manuscript:

• What has been already established, discredited and accepted in the particular field of research
• Areas of controversy and conflicts among different schools of thought
• Unsolved problems and issues in the connected field of research
• The emerging trends and approaches
• How the research extends, builds upon and leaves behind from the previous research

A profound literature review with many relevant sources of reference will enhance the chances of the scientific manuscript publication in renowned and reputed scientific journals .

References:

http://www.math.montana.edu/jobo/phdprep/phd6.pdf

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Conducting a Literature Review

Benefits of conducting a literature review.

• Steps in Conducting a Literature Review
• Summary of the Process
• Additional Resources
• Literature Review Tutorial by American University Library
• The Literature Review: A Few Tips On Conducting It by University of Toronto
• Write a Literature Review by UC Santa Cruz University Library

While there might be many reasons for conducting a literature review, following are four key outcomes of doing the review.

Assessment of the current state of research on a topic . This is probably the most obvious value of the literature review. Once a researcher has determined an area to work with for a research project, a search of relevant information sources will help determine what is already known about the topic and how extensively the topic has already been researched.

Identification of the experts on a particular topic . One of the additional benefits derived from doing the literature review is that it will quickly reveal which researchers have written the most on a particular topic and are, therefore, probably the experts on the topic. Someone who has written twenty articles on a topic or on related topics is more than likely more knowledgeable than someone who has written a single article. This same writer will likely turn up as a reference in most of the other articles written on the same topic. From the number of articles written by the author and the number of times the writer has been cited by other authors, a researcher will be able to assume that the particular author is an expert in the area and, thus, a key resource for consultation in the current research to be undertaken.

Identification of key questions about a topic that need further research . In many cases a researcher may discover new angles that need further exploration by reviewing what has already been written on a topic. For example, research may suggest that listening to music while studying might lead to better retention of ideas, but the research might not have assessed whether a particular style of music is more beneficial than another. A researcher who is interested in pursuing this topic would then do well to follow up existing studies with a new study, based on previous research, that tries to identify which styles of music are most beneficial to retention.

Determination of methodologies used in past studies of the same or similar topics.  It is often useful to review the types of studies that previous researchers have launched as a means of determining what approaches might be of most benefit in further developing a topic. By the same token, a review of previously conducted studies might lend itself to researchers determining a new angle for approaching research.

Upon completion of the literature review, a researcher should have a solid foundation of knowledge in the area and a good feel for the direction any new research should take. Should any additional questions arise during the course of the research, the researcher will know which experts to consult in order to quickly clear up those questions.

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AcademyHealth Presents a Literature Review Summarizing the Research Findings of the Use of Internet Search Data in the Diagnosis of Diseases and Conditions

Sponsored by a grant from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, and in partnership with Innovation Horizons, AcademyHealth conducted a literature review on the use of patient-generated data to assess the capability of the internet as a tool to inform clinical diagnosis practices.

As a component of an ongoing research project to address the gaps in medical care that contribute to delayed or missed diagnosis of serious disease and conditions, AcademyHealth has engaged in a study to examine how the use of a patient’s internet search data can be applied as a data source and tool to inform clinical diagnosis practices. Sponsored by a grant from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, a literature review and comparative analyses were conducted utilizing data from internet searches by patients; the purpose of the review and analyses was to identify correlations (or a lack thereof) between each patient's searches and the corresponding patient's medical diagnoses. While many scientific reviews have previously summarized the utility of population-level internet search data for public health and health outcomes research, this is the first documented assessment of peer-reviewed publications focused on personalized medical diagnostic use. AcademyHealth conducted this study to help guide health services researchers, patient advocates, health care policy makers, and others to learn more about these data resources and their potential to inform new approaches to address diagnostic gaps and opportunities. This approach applies patient-generated data to assess the capability of the internet as a tool to improve understanding of symptoms, illuminate warning signs leading to a medical diagnostic workup, and empower caregivers to more effectively respond to health concerns.

The study design and findings represented in this report were reviewed by an Academy Health multidisciplinary steering committee that approved the report. The report details how researchers obtained and analyzed patient data from Microsoft and Google search engines to then link the data with the corresponding patient’s clinical information. All patient-generated data was provided by patients retrospectively with informed consent for research use. Of the 43 peer-reviewed publications identified and reviewed by AcademyHealth for inclusion in the report, all were retrospective analyses. The analyses included in the report represented a variety of medical and health considerations including cancer, mental health conditions, vulnerability, violence, and personal safety associated with neurodegenerative and aging disorders. Also included in the report were features published by researchers about tools that were developed to enable large data sets to be analyzed and integrated with other data, such as clinical trials and clinical care data. Cumulatively, these publications provide unique insights into the patient information needs, informed consent, and clinical research overview requirements needed to meet standards of conduct for research involving human subjects. 

While many of these research publications identified signals of potential clinical use in diagnosis for specific diseases and conditions, none of the studies offered the type of confirmatory evidence that are required for medical use; at a minimum, evidence required would include prospective randomized studies. Therefore, this nascent type of diagnostic application research using large patient internet search data sets needs additional sponsorship to support infrastructure, analytic approaches, and importantly, innovative study design that enables prospective data collections to avoid bias and ultimately better understand the clinical efficacy and utility of this practice. 

Further information can be found at the Exploring Consumer & Patient Internet Search Data to Improve Diagnosis Grant Program webpage . Innovation Horizons provided the research and analysis with support from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation. 

The Linkage Between Digital Transformation and Organizational Culture: Novel Machine Learning Literature Review Based on Latent Dirichlet Allocation

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• Published: 21 May 2024

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• Tobias Reisberger   ORCID: orcid.org/0009-0003-0190-7368 1 ,
• Philip Reisberger   ORCID: orcid.org/0009-0004-4678-4151 1 ,
• Lukáš Copuš   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-9502-830X 1 ,
• Peter Madzík   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-1655-6500 1 &
• Lukáš Falát   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-2597-7059 2  

Organizational culture is a crucial component of innovation in company success, particularly in the setting of the information economy. The purpose of this research is to conduct a bibliometric analysis in order to identify dominant research topics, their potential shifts, and recent developments in the fields of organizational culture and digital transformation. It demonstrates a machine learning–supported method for identifying and segmenting the current state of this research field. The literature was identified from the Scopus database through a search query. The analyzed amount of papers (3065) was published in 1619 sources (journals, proceedings, books, etc.) with various research impacts. Identifying the dominant research topics resulted in eight topics: Social Media Connectivity; Digital Innovation Ecosystems; Socio-economic Sustainability; Digital Workforce Transformation; Digital Competence and Cultural Transformation; Knowledge, Culture, and Innovation; Data and Resource Management; and Digital Transformation Maturity. The results showed a shift in the research field on organizational culture related to digital transformation towards the subject area of business, management, and accounting, with increasing research interest and impact for the Digital Workforce Transformation as well as for the Knowledge, Culture, and Innovation topics.

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Introduction

In recent years, the world has gone through many events that have changed how we live, relax, work, or communicate. These changes are still resonating in the business environment, for example, in the transition to partial or complete work from home and bring several challenges that organizations have to deal with (Yang et al., 2023 ). One of the crucial areas is the socialization of employees and the formation and maintenance of organizational values expressed by the organizational culture (Noto et al., 2023 ).

Organizational culture has been well-researched since the early 1980s (O’Reilly et al., 1991 ; Schein, 1985 ). The focus originated in American-based qualitative studies and shifted over time towards a more international perspective (Cameron & Quinn, 1999 ; Denison & Mishra, 1995 ; Hofstede, 1998 ), as well as adopting a more quantitative viewpoint with many published papers (O’Reilly et al., 2014 ). Several different areas of organizational culture have already been analyzed, including performance, motivation, leadership, and innovation, among many others (Affes & Affes, 2022 ; Aasi & Rusu, 2017 ; Abu Bakar et al., 2021 ). One of the up-to-date research areas is the topic of digitalization.

The advent of automation and digitalization and the resulting digital transformation in recent history have significantly impacted many markets and organizations and influenced the behaviors and expectations of customers. Digital transformation is driven by several external factors, including the rapid growth and adoption of new technologies that foster e-commerce, big data, a changing competitive landscape, and altered consumption behavior, driven by better-informed, connected, and more empowered customers (Verhoef et al., 2021 ). It provides many challenges and opportunities, including relevant impacts on organizational culture (Alloghani et al., 2022 ). In recent years, the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic has had a significant influence on organizational culture (Daum & Maraist, 2021 ; Spicer, 2020 ).

Even before the pandemic, the fast development of digital technologies, including automation, smart technology, artificial intelligence (AI), and robots, cloud computing, and the Internet of Things (IoT) is radically altering the nature of work and of organizations (Nimawat & Gidwani, 2021 ). The combination of technological advancements was coined as the Fourth Industrial Revolution or Industry 4.0 by Klaus Schwab in late 2015 (Schwab, 2015 ). The speed and scope of current technological changes are prompting concerns about the extent to which new technologies will fundamentally alter organizational cultures, workplaces, or completely replace workers (Acemoglu & Autor, 2011 ; Brynjolfsson & McAfee, 2014 ; Frey & Osborne, 2017 ).

These Industry 4.0 developments and an agile workforce are all components of a global digital transformation that changed the workplace dynamics and led to significant changes in organizations and employee behavior. Due to the unexpected interruption brought on by the coronavirus pandemic, working from anywhere has become the new standard for millions of people worldwide (Özkazanç-Pan & Pullen, 2020 ).

The combination of these two driving forces will have a lasting effect on the formation and effectiveness of organizational culture in the future (Kniffin et al., 2021 ; Trenerry et al., 2021 ). However, the number and range of publications in recent years on organizational culture, digital transformation, Industry 4.0, and COVID-19 make it necessary to provide a structured overview of the published literature.

Firstly, this paper shall give an overview of the research being conducted on organizational culture and digital transformation and identify the main research areas, authors and journals. The methods utilized are outlined, along with the applied bibliometric tools. Secondly, this paper aims to provide an overview of the status quo of research by identifying the different research clusters with its critical analysis.

Literature Review

Research on organizational culture and digital transformation.

Over time, the concept of organizational culture has been the center of attention for many researchers. It has been the main focus of study of several scientific works, especially in management and business (Mohelska & Sokolova, 2018 ; Streimikiene et al., 2021 ; Vallejo, 2011 ).

The concept of organizational culture has been studied from different angles, with researchers exploring the role that organizational culture can play and which factors impact organizational culture (Guzal-Dec, 2016 ; Polyanska et al., 2019 ; Zeng & Luo, 2013 ).

A high number of researchers agree with Schein’s ( 1985 ) model, which asserts that there are three levels at which an organizational culture may be conceptualized: fundamental presumptions and beliefs, norms and values, and cultural artifacts (Chatman & O’Reilly, 2016 ). From the perspective of the organization and its working environment, organizational culture emerges from behavior in which basic assumptions and beliefs are shared and seen as given by organizational members (Schein, 1985 ).

Academics primarily focused on organizational culture’s definition, connotation, structural components and type categorization in the 1980s; most of this research was qualitative (Cui et al., 2018 ). Even though there was no universal agreement on the meanings of organizational culture at the time, Schein’s framework (Schein, 1992 ) was somewhat representational in the academic world. Research on organizational culture then evolved from mainly qualitative research to quantitative studies in the 1990s (Cameron & Quinn, 1999 ; Denison & Mishra, 1995 ; Hofstede, 1998 , 2001 ; O’Reilly et al., 2014 ). According to Cui et al. ( 2018 ), contemporary views of organizational culture are seen as a key factor for success, promoting organizational effectiveness and performance (Gregory et al., 2009 ), organizational innovation (Hogan & Coote, 2014 ), and organizational identity (Ravasi & Schultz, 2006 ). Organizational culture is now considered a key component of innovation in company success, particularly in the setting of the information economy (Büschgens et al., 2013 ). Cartwright identifies nine relevant factors that drive the cultural transformation in organizations that enable successful business practices (Cartwright, 1999 ).

Organizational culture has two basic academic foundations: sociology (organizations have culture) and anthropology (organizations are cultures). The sociological position has become dominant in recent years (Cameron & Quinn, 1999 ). Based on this, there are two opposing viewpoints regarding the possibility of managing organizational culture — the functionalist and symbolist view (Schueber, 2009 ). The functionalist perspective regards culture as an organizational variable (Alvesson, 1993 ), and it can be determined by management (Meek, 1988 ; Silverzweig & Allen, 1976 ). According to the functionalist perspective, culture is seen as something that the organization possesses and can be controlled (Barley et al., 1988 ; Smircich, 1983 ). The symbolist viewpoint regards culture as a representation of what an organization is rather than anything it has . This implies major challenges in controlling or managing organizational culture (Morgan, 1986 ; Smircich, 1983 ). Functionalists would argue that the culture should be changed to fit the strategy, whereas symbolists would propose that the strategy should be adjusted to the organization’s culture (Ogbonna, 1992 ; Senior, 1997 ). In this paper, the functionalist view is supported by implications of the results.

Digitalization is defined as “the transformation of business models as a result of fundamental changes to core internal processes, customer interfaces, products and services, as well as the use of information and communications technologies” (Isensee et al., 2020 ). However, digitalization and digital transformation are quite different. A company may embark on several digitalization initiatives, from automating procedures to retraining staff members to utilize computers. On the other hand, businesses cannot conduct digital transformation as projects. Instead, this more general phrase refers to a client-centered strategic business transformation that calls for adopting digital technology and organizational changes across all departments (Verhoef et al., 2021 ).

An executive’s view that does not distinguish between digitalization and digital transformation could lead to an insufficient strategic focus (Li & Shao, 2023 ). Digital transformation efforts will often involve several digitalization projects, which require management sponsorship and the willingness to change existing structures and practices. Various papers have studied the challenges that may arise from organizational culture when adopting new technologies and structures, e.g., agile practices (Anwar et al., 2016 ; Ghimire et al., 2020 ; Raharjo & Purwandari, 2020 ), technology adoption (Melitski et al., 2010 ), or even Green Supply Chain Management (El Baz & Iddik, 2021 ). As the business becomes primarily customer-driven, digital transformation necessitates improving how well the organization manages change (Anghel, 2019 ).

Industry 4.0 began in the twenty-first century with the development of cyber-physical systems (CPS), the Internet of Things (IoT), the Internet of Services, smart factories, and cloud computing. It continues today (Hermann et al., 2016 ; Kagermann et al., 2013 ; Liao et al., 2017 ; Xu et al., 2018 ). It is characterized as a combination of CPS and IoT in the manufacturing industry, which can have repercussions for value creation, company growth, work organization, and downstream businesses (Kagermann et al., 2013 ; Kiel et al., 2017 ). The advent of Industry 4.0 involves significant changes for organizations and societies and has various effects on nations, businesses, industries, and society (Schwab, 2015 ). Industry 4.0 implementation is a complicated process involving horizontal, vertical and seamless integration and will rely on the synergies between the business and stakeholders from many functional domains (Müller, 2019a , 2019b ; Wang et al., 2016 ). In particular, many organizations fail to capture their Industry 4.0 vision and strategy throughout the change process (Schumacher et al., 2016a ). Other important factors that hinder the application of a successful digital transformation towards a functional Industry 4.0 concept are fear of uncertainty and wrong expectation of requirements (Balasingham, 2016 ). Willingness to adopt this technology is another reason to fail (Adebanjo et al., 2021 ). Organizations aiming to incorporate and adopt digital transformation into their operational procedures must recognize and assess important critical factors (Nimawat & Gidwani, 2021 ).

Organizational communication and collaboration styles have changed due to globalization, advancements in information and communication technologies (ICTs), an increase in hybrid work models and the rise of computer-mediated groups (Sharma et al., 2022 ). With the knowledge economy, digital culture, and recent technological innovations, new working styles have quietly emerged in organizations (Powell et al., 2004 ). Then, the spreading of the coronavirus and the required shift in transition to remote working acted as a catalyst for how organizations operate and employees engage. The drastic changes in the workplace naturally affected employees and spurred changes in their behavior and attitudes (Caligiuri et al., 2020 ). The corresponding research topic of COVID-19-related impacts and the implications on digital transformation in the context of organizational culture is relatively new. Many partial aspects that have gained new relevance during the corona pandemic have already received attention in the research community over the past 20 years.

Therefore, this study aims to conduct a bibliometric analysis in order to identify dominant research topics, their potential shifts, and recent developments in the fields of organizational culture and digital transformation. The most significant research articles or authors and their related relationships can be found using the scientific computer-aided review process known as bibliometric analysis. It can help to forecast the possible direction of such identified fields and is widely applied in academic research (Diem & Wolter, 2013 ). This method aids in providing a thorough overview of the subject as well as visually summarizing its patterns and trends (Baker et al., 2020 ; Zhou et al., 2020 ).

Overview of Bibliometric Reviews

The topic of organizational culture has had a large number of contributors in the past decades. Several articles were published on organizational culture as bibliometric studies (Cicea et al., 2022 ). Only a few reviews were conducted on digital transformation in organizations related to organizational culture (e.g., as digitalization). Table 1 lists a few publications on these topics.

Overview of Systematic Reviews

Apart from bibliometric literature reviews, many authors have conducted systematic literature reviews on various research areas relating to organizational culture and digital transformation. As seen in the following non-conclusive overview in Table  2 and Table  3 , researchers have focused their attention on heterogeneous study fields like performance-orientation, entrepreneurship, Industry 4.0, agile practices, work-from-anywhere, SMEs, and many others. This broad overview indicates that the topic of organizational culture plays a very relevant role in recent research, especially in the context of digital transformation.

The provided overview on digital transformation research mainly focuses on functional areas and its application. The center of research is the implementation, readiness, adoption, as well as barriers, opportunities, and challenges. Additionally, research fields like examining potential directions (Belinski et al., 2020 ; Kamble et al., 2018 ; Pagliosa et al., 2019 ; Piccarozzi et al., 2018 ; Schneider, 2018 ; Sony & Naik, 2020 ); implementation, readiness and adoption (Çınar et al., 2021 ; Pacchini et al., 2019 ; Sung & Kim, 2021 ); barriers, opportunities, and challenges to the adoption and implementation of Industry 4.0 (Bajic et al., 2021 ; Raj et al., 2020 ); and sustainability (de Sousa Jabbour et al., 2018 ; Luthra & Mangla, 2018 ) are analyzed.

The main focus areas, among many others, which are influenced by digital transformation are agile and collaborative teamwork and management (Kerber & Buono, 2004 ; Huang et al., 2003 ; Sheppard, 2020 ; Parry & Battista, 2019 ; Singer-Velush et al. 2020 ; Hamouche, 2020 ), adaptive business culture in dynamic , supportive , environments , with focus on employee well-being , work design , open innovation , workforce effectiveness (Am et al., 2020 ; Ngoc Su et al., 2021 ; Baker et al., 2006 ; Žižek et al., 2021 ; Parry & Battista, 2019 ; Bélanger et al., 2013 ; Carnevale & Hatak, 2020 ), and recent technological developments (Ågerfalk et al., 2020 ; Bloom et al., 2015 ; Bondarouk & Ruël, 2009 ; Johnson et al., 2020 ; Spreitzer et al., 2017 ; Wiggins et al., 2020 ).

Research Gap

The research mentioned in the aforementioned literature review sought to examine several factors of organizational culture and digital transformation. However, reviews of literature based solely on a systematic or bibliometric methodology have significant drawbacks. Studies of systematic literature reviews are frequently in-depth and typically handle only a small number of documents. As a result, the findings are more constrained (Moher et al., 2015 ; Page et al., 2021 ). Contrarily, bibliometric reviews are concentrated on a wider range of the studied areas. They mostly reveal major trends as an outcome (Cobo et al., 2011 ; van Eck & Waltman, 2010 ). Using machine learning to find latent patterns in textual data is one of the most popular study methods in the field of bibliometric review (Han, 2020 ; Mariani & Baggio, 2022 ). Automated processing is used to analyze the scientific publications for our study. It employs an advanced machine learning–based methodology to extract topics from the scientific literature. This paper contributes to the existing literature by answering the following research questions:

Research Question 1 (RQ1) . How has the organizational culture — digital transformation relationship evolved over time?

The number of publications on digital transformation is growing, and organizational culture is a well-established research area with years of academic work. Consequently, a bibliometric analysis of the growth of the top journals, articles, and most cited publications may be able to provide relevant insights.

Research Question 2 (RQ2) . What are the dominant research topics on organizational culture and digital transformation?

The total number of publications on the subject of this study is rapidly increasing. Therefore, we may apply machine learning to extract particular study ideas from a large body of published scientific literature.

Research Methodology

This paper aims to establish the trends of research papers in the field of organizational culture research with a focus on digital transformation. The authors conducted the review of the literature using bibliometric analysis and a machine learning method.

Researchers often undertake bibliometric analysis with the main goal to determine the body of knowledge on a certain subject, to provide an assessment of the research already conducted, and to develop networking structures for the scientific community. Five steps ( study design , data collection , data analysis , data visualization , and interpretation of results ) represent the workflow of science mapping and were used to apply the bibliometric approach and network analysis (Aria & Cuccurullo, 2017 ).

The review usually starts by determining the database that contains the input data. The only source for this paper are the bibliographic records from the Scopus database as data collection input. This source has been considered reliable in prior works. Scopus, developed by Elsevier B.V., is the largest database of scientific peer-review literature hosting more than 27,950 journal published articles (Elsevier, 2023 ). It was chosen for this study as it is the largest and most relevant scientific database in the world, covering most of the publications available. This includes consistent repositories of documents as well as additional information such as country of all the authors, citations per document, and further information that is relevant in terms of quality and quantity for the study.

The search query was developed after identifying the research area. This was done by splitting the topic into three fields of research. The first set was organization with the corresponding synonyms followed by culture (second set). The third was digital transformation and its phases digitization and digitalization following Verhoef et al. ( 2021 ) and its synonyms including Industry 4.0 . The database was queried using additional synonyms and alternative spellings to increase the study’s coverage.

To collect these articles, the combination of the following keywords was selected:

Digital transformation , digitalization , digitalisation , digitization , digitisation combined with Industry 4.0 search terms fourth industrial revolution , 4IR , 4-IR , industry 4.0 and the organizational culture related keyword organisation *, organization *, firm , company , corporate , enterprise , business and culture .

The search criteria were then determined. The authors used the title , abstract and keywords from the articles provided by the Scopus database (TITLE-ABS-KEY). This resulted in 3077 identified papers. The search query and result are shown in Table  4 . The search was conducted on March 30, 2023.

After collecting the data, all documents with no abstracts were removed. The authors also removed all documents with abstracts defined as: “[No abstract available]”. After this removal, the dataset consisted of 3065 documents. The applied dataset was made up of the following eight variables: authors, title, year, source, cited by, abstract, authors keywords, index keywords. A total of 139 documents were tagged as Review . In addition, to answer the research question RQ1, we joined our dataset with a dataset that defined individual subject areas for each journal. Thanks to such an expanded dataset, we were able to better structure the results.

Topic Modelling

In order to be able to answer research question RQ2, we needed to perform an analysis of the sentific field. There are several ways to conduct a literature review. Instead of the standard literature review process, we decided to carry out the literature review based on machine learning. This way of analyzing the scientific field allowed us to assess a much larger number of documents and thus make the literature review more relevant. Our review based on machine learning analyzed 3065 document abstracts in total.

Before the actual process of identifying individual research topics in the selected area, it was necessary to perform text preprocessing and then divide the analyzed documents into individual topics. Data preprocessing included several steps which are common in text analytics. After removing some special characters, we removed punctuation, further removed numbers and stopwords defined in the tm package in R. In addition, we defined other custom stopwords that were removed from the corpus of abstracts. Then we then removed the extra spaces and stemmed the words in the document. The last step was to delete custom stopwords Footnote 1 specific to our area of interest. In this case, these were words that were irrelevant to our field of research and, in our opinion, did not add value to the resulting analysis. We defined these words based on the frequency analysis of stemmed words from the corpus of analyzed abstracts. The mentioned procedures were performed in the R programming language using the tm and SnowballC packages. After removing the specific stopwords, we finally removed the extra spaces. Subsequently, a document-term matrix (dtm) was created, which contained the frequencies of all individual words in every document. Since the dtm itself also contained low-frequency words, we removed words that appeared in less than 0.5% of the abstracts in the resulting matrix. The resulting dtm contained 1108 words.

After preprocessing the text of the abstracts, we proceeded to structure the abstracts into research topics. We implemented the mentioned process, also called topic modeling, using the Latent Dirichlet Allocation method, also known as LDA (Blei et al., 2003 ). LDA is a probabilistic generative process, the result of which is a set of topics that represent the composition of the entire space into individual parts. Based on the words in individual documents, the so-called latent topical structure is created, while latent topics are a mixture of several documents. Based on the posterior estimates of the hidden variables, we can estimate the structure of the latent topics. Hidden variables in our case represent latent topical structure (Blei & Lafferty, 2009 ).

Topic modeling using LDA was implemented in the R programming language using the topicmodels library. Topic modeling itself assumes the number of topics into which the entire space needs to be divided. There are several approaches for finding the number of topics. Since the approach based on the evaluation of statistical criteria resulted in a large number of topics, we decided to prefer an expert approach. This approach consisted in manually assessing the interpretability of the most frequent words in individual alternatives. As part of the testing itself for a suitable number of topics, we gradually manually evaluated solutions with the number of topics k  = {6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12}.

To quantify the parameters of the LDA model, we used Gibbs sampling (Gelfand, 2000 ; Griffiths & Steyvers, 2004 ; Grün & Hornik, 2011 ). For parameter quantification, we used 2000 iterations, taking into account only every 200th observation for a higher degree of independence between. For each k, we repeated the process five times, always recording only the best solution. Based on the results of the expert analysis, we chose a solution with the number of topics k  = 8. Finally, we realized the visualization of topics, which was performed using the ldavis package (Sievert & Shirley, 2014 ).

Development of Related Research Papers

The direct or indirect role of organizational culture in various processes of digital transformation has been the subject of a lot of research. The studies that formed the basis for our analysis were identified from the Scopus bibliometric database through a search query, which is presented in the “ Research Methodology ” section. The data was collected on March 30, 2023, while on this date, 3065 valid documents were registered in the mentioned database. A significant increase in the number of studies has only been noticeable since 2018. Still, it must be said that studies investigating the links between organizational culture and digitalization appeared sporadically even before that. Figure  1 shows an overview of the annual development of published papers and the number of citations related to the given papers. We can notice that in the last 5 years, research has an exponential character (measured through the number of published papers per year), but at the same time, this research area is interesting for academics (measured through the absolute number of citations).

Development of published papers related to organizational culture and digital transformation

The analyzed amount of papers were published in 1619 sources (journals, proceedings, books, etc.) with various research impacts. Table 5 shows the ranking of the sources that had the greatest impact on research on organizational culture and digital transformation in terms of the total number of citations. The research impact is primarily dominated by journals that directly or indirectly deal with the business environment, which is natural considering the nature of the papers. Of the ten listed top influential papers, as many as seven are from the last 5 years, which indicates that since 2018, research interest and the research impact of the given topic have grown dramatically.

Each analyzed document in our dataset was assigned to one of the 28 subject areas used by the Scopus database for their classification. Such an assignment took place based on pairing information about the journal in which the given article is located with the categorization of the journal according to the subject areas of the Scopus database. Figure  2 shows an overview of research interest and research impact for the individual subject areas.

Overview of research impact and research interest of subject areas

Until 2019, ENGI (engineering) was the most frequent category, while a dramatic increase in papers in the BUSI (business, management, and accounting) group can be seen in the last four years. This increase has caused BUSI to be the subject area with the most outstanding research impact and research interest. No such significant changes were recorded in the other subject areas. Possible reasons for the increased interest of researchers in the field of BUSI in the topic of organizational culture and digital transformation are indirectly indicated by some current studies. For example, the study by Priyanto et al. ( 2023 ) emphasizes the importance of proactively modernizing a business to maintain a competitive edge. The need to increase the competitive edge was also pointed out in the study by Troise et al. ( 2022 ), in which the authors examined the relationships between SMEs’ agility (measured by digital technologies capability, relational capability, and innovation capability) and the effects of agility on three outcomes (financial performance, product and process innovation). These studies and many others (Alomari, 2021 ; Carvalho et al., 2020 ; Chaurasia et al., 2020 ; Tessarini Junior & Saltorato, 2021 ) emphasize the managerial aspect of digitalization, which could explain the dramatic increase in research interest and research impact that we have seen over the last 4 years.

These results are also confirmed by a more detailed analysis of the development of the annual number in the five most numerous subject areas (Fig.  3 ). In the left part, we can see the absolute number of articles in the given subject areas, while the dominance of BUSI is visible mainly in the last three years. However, comparing the share of papers in particular subject areas is very interesting (right part of Fig.  3 ). We see that the increase in the BUSI subject area is continuous, while the share of SOCI (social sciences) and COMP (computer science) is decreasing in the long term. Areas such as ENGI and DECI (decision science) maintain a relatively constant share. According to the long-term trend, it can be assumed that the share of the BUSI subject area will grow in research on topics related to organizational culture and digital transformation in the coming years.

Development of papers in top 5 subject areas — absolute numbers (left) and share (right)

Topics Identification and Their Development

By analyzing the abstracts of the individual papers, it was possible to categorize documents into thematically related clusters using LDA. Such clusters contain papers with the occurrence of the same terms and are called topics. The individual steps of extracting topics from the analyzed dataset are listed in the “ Topic Modelling ” section. To choose the number of topics, several experiments were carried out with the aim of identifying such a constellation in which the individual topics would be well interpretable and, at the same time, sufficiently distinguishable from each other. The number of topics k  = 8 was selected by expert assessment according to these criteria. The results and a brief description of the topics via the top-5 most frequent terms can be found in Fig.  4 as an intertopic distance map between two principal components (PC).

Intertopic distance map

Eight identified topics were analyzed with regard to the most frequented words, and at the same time, the most cited articles in the given topic were also used for their better characterization. This allowed these topics to be named and briefly characterized:

Social Media Connectivity (Topic-1)

This topic includes various aspects of digital and social media, as well as online platforms and the cultural impacts of digital technologies. The Social Media Connectivity topic focuses on main areas like the rise of social media (Munar, 2012 ; van Dijck, 2013 ), its platforms (Mikos, 2016 ; Morris, 2015 ), as well as structural change (Kim, 2020 ; Peukert, 2019 ). The articles of topic-1 explore a wide range of subjects in particular such as social media strategies, digital engagement with heritage, digital storytelling, cultural globalization, and the transformative effects of digital technological change. There are many different inter-organizational subcultures present within organizations that are dealing with convergence and cooperation across media platforms. According to Erdal ( 2009 ), cooperation between those cultures is frequently linked to competition. It is the topic with the most significant research interest (measured through the number of papers), and at the same time, it is the topic with the highest research impact (measured through the number of citations). There are 458 related papers in this topic with a sum of all citations of 91% (based on a 6000 citation strip).

Digital Innovation Ecosystems (Topic-2)

This topic captures the overarching theme of digital transformation across various domains. It emphasizes the integration of digital technologies, innovation processes and the development of ecosystems to drive transformative change in industries and organizations with regard to culture. Regarding the function of organizational culture throughout this transformation process, two alternative viewpoints may be seen. When individuals are empowered to use their problem-solving skills, their capacity for learning and their sense of responsibility, a culture may result in a workforce that is people-centered and engaged driving the integration of digital technologies. On the other hand, there is a culture that focuses primarily on promoting this technology for the purpose of managing or substituting processes neglecting the input and use of people (Rossini et al., 2021 ). The main subjects of this topic include healthcare (Jacob et al., 2020 ), manufacturing (Reinhardt et al., 2020 ), and a digital transformation focus of information systems and organizational practices (Ulas, 2019 ). Additionally, the challenges for the organization and management in rapidly changing environments are analyzed (Granlund & Taipaleenmäki, 2005 ). This topic has a relatively considerable research interest with 419 papers published, but its research impact is average with 51%.

Socio-economic Sustainability (Topic-3)

The Socio-economic Sustainability topic captures the intersection of digital transformation, sustainability and socio-economic considerations across a wide variety of domains such as urban development (Anttiroiko, 2016 ), corporate responsibility and sustainability (Etter et al., 2019 ; Lăzăroiu et al., 2020 ), technology management (Tasleem et al., 2019 ), and organizational practices with regard to culture, among others. In the case of sustainable performance, all forms of organizational culture — based on the types defined by Quinn and Spreitzer ( 1991 ) — have a positive effect on sustainable performance (Gebril Taha & Espino-Rodríguez, 2020 ). There is also a strong correlation between organizational culture and eco-innovation (Reyes-Santiago et al., 2017 ). Furthermore, the sharing economy and its cultural effects towards consumption and ownership are analyzed (Dabbous & Tarhini, 2021 ). The third topic has an average research interest, counting 367 papers and a slightly below-average research impact of 42% compared to the other topics.

Digital Workforce Transformation (Topic-4)

Digital Workforce Transformation highlights the themes of digital transformation with the focus of organizational resilience, leadership, and the impact of technology on work culture and employee well-being. The main focus is on the employee-work relationship, including subjects like leadership (Cortellazzo et al., 2019 ; Guzmán et al., 2020 ), employee well-being (Coldwell, 2019 ; Theurer et al., 2018 ), and resilience (McFadden et al., 2015 ). In particular, the implications on cultural organizational characteristics, operations, digital transformation, and financial planning of COVID-19 for work, workers, and organizations are analyzed (Kniffin et al., 2021 ; Obrenovic et al., 2020 ). As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, many organizations have changed their mode of operation. They adopted a pure work from home model or make use of a hybrid mode of operation. Establishing a communicative work from home culture will result in increased employee satisfaction (Fay & Kline, 2011 ; Mandal et al., 2023 ). Organizations have to educate their employees concerning these new processes and technologies. Individuals dislike change, so organizations must coordinate training and awareness programs to demonstrate the advantages of new digital platforms and related technologies (Mandal et al., 2023 ). Regarding research interest, this topic is average with 381 papers, and its research impact is slightly below average with 42%.

Digital Competence and Cultural Transformation (Topic-5)

This topic refers to the concepts of competence in the digital era, cultural transformation, innovation, and sustainability. These articles explore different aspects of digital transformation (Suárez-Guerrero et al., 2016 ), the impact of digital competence on various sectors (Konttila et al., 2019 ), cultural factors in innovation and enterprise, and the intersection of technology and culture (Mohelska & Sokolova, 2018 ). The role of leadership in the transformation of organizational culture is also a focus of analysis (Sá & Serpa, 2020 ). From the point of view of research interest, this is a minor topic (355 papers) that simultaneously has a relatively small research impact (33%).

Knowledge, Culture and Innovation (Topic-6)

Knowledge, Culture, and Innovation captures the common themes of knowledge management (Gandini, 2016 ; Yeh et al., 2006 ), organizational culture (Dubey et al., 2019 ), innovation, and the transformative effects (Ungerman et al., 2018 ) of digitalization across various sectors. Digital innovation is linked to organizational culture by the digital capabilities of an organization (Zhen et al., 2021 ). The capabilities required by management in dynamic environments are examined in particular (Karimi & Walter, 2015 ). Research interest, counting 388 papers, as well as research impact, with 56%, of this topic are both average.

Data and Resource Management (Topic-7)

The Data and Resource Management topic encompasses the concepts of digitalization, Industry 4.0, data management, quality management, organizational culture and the impact of technology on various industries (Durana et al., 2019 ; Gunasekaran et al., 2019 ; Sony et al., 2020 ). These titles explore different aspects of implementing Industry 4.0, including the utilization of big data (Chiang et al., 2017 ), improving organizational performance through digital transformation (Ananyin et al., 2018 ) and the role of data-driven decision-making in different sectors. A number of relevant factors for Industry 4.0 implementation like the development of Industry 4.0-specific know-how, securing financial resources, integration of employees into the implementation process, and the establishment of an open-minded and flexible corporate culture are analyzed. (Veile et al., 2020 ). The research interest of this topic is the smallest of all with only 315 papers, and its research impact is also relatively small with 34%.

Digital Transformation Maturity (Topic-8)

This topic covers the concepts of digital transformation, Industry 4.0, maturity models, organizational culture, and the impact of technology on business strategies and performance (Gajsek et al., 2019 ; Teichert, 2019 ). These titles explore various aspects of digitalization, technology implementation, strategic management, organizational resilience, and the adoption factors of Industry 4.0 in the manufacturing industry (Kohnová et al., 2019 ). The analysis shows that factors like organizational identity, dematerialization, and collaboration play a key role in the digital transformation (Tronvoll et al., 2020 ). The size of research interest of this topic is average (382 papers), but its research impact is among the largest (of 80%).

These topics are sufficiently distinguishable from each other not only from an interpretive point of view but also within the position in the intertopic distance map (Fig.  4 ). In the coordinates of two principal components, almost all topics are relatively isolated, meaning they are sufficiently distinguishable from each other. In one case, however, a statistical similarity was identified, namely for topic-2 Digital Innovation Ecosystems and topic-8 Digital Transformation Maturity (Fig.  4 top left). This finding suggests that there is some interrelationship between the two topics. After a closer examination of the articles from both topics, it was found that topic-2 and topic-8 share a rather similar basis of content. The central point of investigation in these articles is the identification of various (success) factors and challenges that arise for organizations and their cultures during the phase of digital transformation (AlBar & Hoque, 2019 ; Cichosz et al., 2020 ; Shardeo et al., 2020 ). Topic-2 builds on this common foundation by focusing on systems and functional aspects. There, the organization’s implementation, integration, and management of tools and data (ERP, big data) is examined. Additionally, this topic focuses on the organization’s life cycle, evolution, business models, and processes like DevOps and Agile development (Gupta et al., 2019 ; Jacob et al., 2020 ; Nascimento et al., 2019 ). On the other hand, the majority of the articles in topic-8 focus on a perspective with regard to the organizational readiness of the organization towards changes related to Industry 4.0, including the impacts those changes will have on culture, the implications for strategy, and the general organization’s maturity through the examination of maturity models (Ganzarain & Errasti, 2016 ; Mittal et al., 2018 ; Santos & Martinho, 2020 ; Schumacher et al., 2016a , b ).

The eight topics identified are not static and their development may change over time. To capture such changes, we analyzed the share of papers (research interest) and the share of citations (research impact) of papers in the last 10 years. We did not analyze the absolute numbers but their relative share primarily to avoid the risk of distortion caused by the exponential increase in the number of articles and citations. The results can be found in Fig.  5 .

Development of research interest (top) and research impact (bottom) in last 10 years

Several findings can be seen in Fig.  5 . The first of them is a marked decrease in topic-1 both from the point of view of research interest and the point of view of research impact. As mentioned earlier, this topic is currently one of the most important. However, trend analysis shows that its importance is declining relatively quickly. It is gradually being replaced by topics with higher research interest (e.g., topic-4) or research impact (e.g., topic-6).

The downward trend of topic-1 Social Media Connectivity can be explained with the growing maturity of this research field. In the early start of the new millennium, the rise of social networks and communication platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Whatsapp, and other social media services and applications changed the way of communication and collaboration. As of 2023, this field of research is established and many papers have been published and cited already. Based on our search query, there were 458 papers identified with over 5400 citations in total from 1997 to 2023.

The second finding is the gradual emergence of new topics. These are topics that almost or did not exist 10 years ago. The most significant representative of such topics is topic-4, which almost did not exist in 2013, but is currently one of the most important topics. The upward trend of topic-4 Digital Workforce Transformation is strongly connected with the emergence of new working modes and cultural shifts within the organizational landscape due to COVID-19 pandemic related effects. The rise of topic-4 with a strong focus on the employee-work relationship and employee well-being is relatively new. This was triggered with the start of the worldwide pandemic (COVID-19). The worldwide pandemic had a significant impact on how people worked and communicated. This remote work model has many implications on a number of different fields like organizational culture, collaboration, employee motivation, and productivity, among many others. Thus, the requirement for employees and the organizations to adapt to this new work reality open up many new research fields. The growing topic-6 Knowledge, Culture, and Innovation combines knowledge management, organizational culture, and innovation in regard to the transformative effects of digitalization across various sectors. This topic recently gained special attention because the world economy is facing challenges during the pandemic caused by less international business and trade and increased costs (Amirul et al., 2023 ). Competitive advantages through knowledge management, knowledge sharing, and innovation are the key to deal with the (project) uncertainty many companies face (Borodako et al., 2023 ).

The third finding is that increasing research interest does not necessarily increase research impact. For example, we can mention topic-5 Digital Competence and Cultural Transformation , which is gradually gaining research interest, but its research impact is the smallest of all. However, it should be noted here that research impact is based on processing the number of citations, which can generally have a time delay.

A more detailed characterization of topics is also possible by comparing them to the analyzed subject areas. Figure  6 shows the decomposition of individual topics into subject areas. The basis for this decomposition was the papers themselves.

Decomposition of topics to subject areas

Several findings can be seen in Fig.  6 . Topic-1, which currently dominates research impact and research interest, but has a negative trend, is most associated with papers from the SOCI subject area. If we compare these results with the analysis of subject areas (Fig.  2 ), we can conclude that there are two parallel phenomena — a decrease in interest in both SOCI and topic-1. This topic played a key role in the past, but its outlook, as well as the outlook of organizational culture research in relation to digital transformation in the SOCI subject area, is negative. On the other hand, we can see that the BUSI subject area is most prominently represented in topic-6. By comparing the development of BUSI and the development of topic-6, we can also notice parallel phenomena — in this case, however, with a positive trend. Both topic-6 and the BUSI subject area have been growing in recent years, and it is assumed that this could be the case in the following years as well. In the past the focus of research has been on identification and introduction as well as adaptation of new technologies that drive the trend of digital transformation. With this established foundation, nowadays, the research shifts more towards the application and impacts of these technologies in organizations and its consequences on innovation-orientation, knowledge generation and sharing as well as cultural effects (Kronblad et al., 2023 ). This can be seen with the strengthening of topic-6. Other topics appear more heterogeneous from the point of view of subject areas, and the papers that fall into them are from different subject areas.

This article begins with a brief review of organizational culture research in relation to digital transformation. Later, an overview of the research area was presented based on the 3065 publications listed and identified in the Scopus database. To answer research question 1, we have identified the key journals, papers and authors and have shown the development of publications over time. Research interest and research impact of the given topic have grown dramatically since 2018. According to research areas, from 2004 until 2023, the share of papers (research impact) as well as the share of citations (research interest) is mainly contributed to the subject area of BUSI (with a share of more than 25%). The dominance of BUSI has been visible mainly in the last 3 years.

The identification of the dominant research topics (research question 2) resulted in eight topics: Social Media Connectivity , Digital Innovation Ecosystems , Socio-economic Sustainability , Digital Workforce Transformation , Digital Competence and Cultural Transformation , Knowledge, Culture and Innovation , Data and Resource Management , and Digital Transformation Maturity . The topic with the most significant research interest (measured by the number of papers) and the highest research impact (measured by the number of citations) is Social Media Connectivity (topic-1). This is because of the strong role of this topic in the past. The outlook is declining for this topic as well as the related subject area SOCI. Two rising topics were identified. In recent years Digital Workforce Transformation (topic-4) and Knowledge, Culture, and Innovation (topic-6) gained strong interest. Both are from the area of BUSI.

To fulfil the aims of the article, following the completion of the literature review, we were able to identify a number of research topics that are distinct due to the methodology that we have utilized. As a result of their development over time, some of these topics are also relatively new; for instance, as of 2013, topic-4 ( Digital Workforce Transformation ) did not exist at all. In light of the fact that the topics have developed over time, it is clear that the most important areas influencing culture have been transformed under the conditions brought about by digital transformation.

Implications

Firstly, this study demonstrated a machine learning–supported method for identifying and segmenting the current state of this research field. This method, as used in this paper, can be applied to other fields to obtain a systematic overview of research topics.

Secondly, organizational culture has been a field of research for many years and research on digital transformation is constantly growing. The interrelation of these two research areas is relatively new, and their findings will have a lasting effect on the formation and effectiveness of organizational culture in the future.

With the increased interest in Digital Workforce Transformation and Knowledge, Culture, and Innovation , we could identify a shift in the research field on organizational culture in relation to digital transformation towards the subject area of BUSI. Those two rising topics show a need to focus on the impact of technology on work culture and employee well-being, as well as on knowledge management and innovation in relation to organizational culture.

The long-term trend of the share development of the BUSI subject area indicates that this area will also grow continuously in the future. From 2019 onwards, the constant increase of papers published per year implies that additional distinct new topics will be established in this field of research. These and other future trends will help researchers to focus on relevant topics and areas for their work.

A possible explanation for this shift in research could derive from the impact technological changes have on businesses today. The work-related requirements during the COVID-19 pandemic acted as a catalyst for many technological advancements due to the necessity to work instantly remote, changing many processes and all communication to digital. This growing importance of technology for every business could lead to an increased relevance and importance for management practice as well as for researchers. An additional cause for organizations to reevaluate matters related to knowledge and innovation is the pervasive integration and accessibility of AI technology in routine business operations. The alignment of current processes, particularly the innovation process within organizations, with this novel capability will be a subject of interest for managers and researchers as well.

Following the functionalist perspective on organizational culture, the management of organizations can attempt to control and change culture (Alvesson, 1993 ). The introduction of these two topics has significant implications for management practice. A strong organizational culture that is people-centered is essential for successful knowledge-driven organizational innovation. As a result, managers must pay special attention to the factors that influence work culture, address the challenges that arise during the transformation, and understand and improve their organization’s digital capabilities.

Managers can focus their efforts on a variety of areas to foster an adaptable, innovative, and supportive work culture while effectively leveraging technology for digital transformation. Enhanced emphasis is placed on the behavior and collaboration of the team and managers, while these recommendations also encompass measures pertaining to the structure and processes.

The delegation of decision-making authority and work ownership responsibility to employees by managers is a critical structural element. Utilizing data to facilitate well-informed decision-making can provide support for this. Establishing a work environment that offers adequate resources and support, including tools, training, and assistance in adjusting to digital transformations and fostering innovation, is an additional critical element (Veile et al., 2020 ). Furthermore, it is beneficial to measure and communicate progress by assessing the impact of digital transformation on work culture, employee well-being, knowledge management, and innovation on a regular basis. The manager should be willing to make the necessary cultural changes to align, adapt, and evolve organizational culture in the digital age (Cortellazzo et al., 2019 ).

During digital transformation, an open and productive organizational culture will be fostered through the promotion of a flexible and inclusive work environment that actively solicits employee feedback and input, with a focus on employee well-being (Coldwell, 2019 ). Managers who set a good example and encourage their employees’ continuous learning and skill development, as well as cross-functional collaboration, will be better able to promote an adaptive organizational culture in an increasingly digital and competitive landscape (Sá & Serpa, 2020 ). Creating a culture that values innovation and encourages employees to come up with new ideas and solutions, as well as celebrating successful innovations, can help managers create a people-oriented work culture that is essential for organizational innovation (Karimi & Walter, 2015 ). This can be seen in the increased interest in the area on Knowledge, Culture, and Innovation by organizations as well as by researchers.

Limitations and Future Research

This study has a number of limitations, which can be mainly attributed to the way the analysis was conducted. The focus of this study is on an automated bibliometric analysis of the literature. While the quantitative focus has many advantages, it also has some limitations. The main advantage includes the possibility to process and analyze a large number of papers via automation and machine learning techniques. A total of 3065 papers were analyzed. This approach — in comparison to a standard systematic literature review — does not analyze the papers manually. Therefore, some relevant documents could be missing, as well as some irrelevant ones might be included. The authors have selected a search query that yields highly relevant search results. Thus, it is assumed that the share of notable articles that are missing is very small and therefore neglectable and does not have a significant impact on the results.

The applied dataset covers most of the important publications, but all the data comes from just one database (Scopus). This is not comprehensive, and some relevant articles (or journals) could be excluded. In addition, some information may be missing because the source of analysis is not the full text of the articles. Another limitation comes from the fact that the primary focus in the topic modeling are the abstracts of the relevant papers and not the whole text. The analysis of the full text could potentially provide a more extensive understanding, but at the same time, it would take much longer.

We decided on the expert approach by determining the number of topics, as the statistical approach resulted in a large number of topics. This may be of a subjective nature, but it resulted in eight well interpretable and sufficiently distinguishable topics. The title, abstract, and keywords of each topic’s top-30 papers (based on citation count) were used to name each topic. This results in subjective topic names but helps to sum up each topic with a generalized distinct phrase.

This study suggests a number of possible future directions for additional research. It is recommended to extend the data sources to other databases than Scopus as well as the search query. This could result in capturing an increased number of relevant papers. In this research two developing, fast growing topics (topic-4 and topic-6) were identified. Further research should concentrate on examining this trend and focusing on those topics.

Future research could concentrate on finding various organizational culture types that reflect and favor those two emerging topics. Considering Quinn and Rohrbaugh’s CVF (Cameron & Quinn, 1999 ; Quinn & Rohrbaugh, 1983 ), the characteristics of the adhocracy culture type may align with the aspects connected to Digital Workforce Transformation and Knowledge, Culture and Innovation as this culture type values innovation and flexibility. This can be supported through the systematic research and cultural audits in organizations.

Data Availability

The data and code that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon request.

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Reisberger, T., Reisberger, P., Copuš, L. et al. The Linkage Between Digital Transformation and Organizational Culture: Novel Machine Learning Literature Review Based on Latent Dirichlet Allocation. J Knowl Econ (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13132-024-02027-3

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