Clarifying the Goal

The first step is to clarify the goal of your literature review. This includes clarifying who it is for, available space, and where it will be published. These things determine the length of the literature review, how much in-depth it will be, and how you will structure your research. A background/research overview will be less than a literature review as part of a thesis or dissertation, and that will be less than a stand-alone literature review document.

Reviewing the research question is also important for a systematic literature review, and consists of a question you are trying to answer based on the literature. It should also have no more than three components, such as:

• Context or population,
• Predictor or intervention, and
• Outcome.

The scope of the literature review—both what it covers and what it does not cover—is important as well. First, defining or operationalizing what it is should be included, as well as inclusion criteria. To get a sense of the scope and to facilitate your review’s organization, it also is important to conduct some preliminary research. This will help you to determine the breadth and depth of your literature review as well.

Your review should not be too broad, and you want to be as deep as possible, but you should also be systematic and thorough in selecting your material so as not to introduce bias.