Writing a Literature Review

Abstract

(create) Literature reviews occupy an important corner of the world of scientific activity, yet most scientists do not receive training on how to write them. As our field's knowledge base expands month by month, it becomes increasingly important to be able to master the amount of information already published. New ideas increasingly have to build on previously published works. In many cases, psychologists can now test their theories without collecting data at all--they can simply rely on works already published. Literature reviews are special for a couple reasons. First, they combine results of many different studies, and that gives them power and value that no single study can have. Second, literature reviews permit researchers to address broad questions. This chapter discusses narrative and meta-analytic reviews, searching the literature, hypotheses in advance, the value of null findings, types of possible conclusions, and common problems and errors in literature reviews. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)