What You Want to Learn About Writing in College

You are now facing the most daunting task of your college career: writing a comprehensive literature review that will get you into the next journal club discussion or research paper. Congratulations! You have been accepted into a top-notch college, and soon enough you will be faced with exciting new opportunities and expectations. While you wait for the review to process, you can use this time to further develop your writing skills, and in the process, learn a great deal about writing in general, and how to write a literature review in particular.

The Purpose of a Literature Review

The purpose of a literature review is to examine a set of written works (journal articles, books, etc.) and provide an in-depth analysis of one particular aspect of literature that you have chosen. In other words, you are answering the question, “What have other people learned about this topic—and how can I apply that knowledge to my own field of study?”

For example, if you are a chemistry major and are working on a paper for your English class, you might choose to do a literature review on modern chemistry and how it has evolved over the years. In this instance, you will need to conduct extensive research, reading numerous articles (about 150 is a good number to start with), and then organize all of that information into a coherent, systematic argument. When you are finally finished, you will have a nicely compiled and thoroughly referenced summary of what you know about modern chemistry and how it has evolved over time. This is what a literature review is—a summary of existing knowledge.

The Components of a Literate Review

In order to write a literature review, you will need to consider several components:

• The problem (this is the topic of your paper)
  • The available solutions (what other people have suggested to solve the problem)
    • Pros and cons of each solution (the advantages and disadvantages of each proposed approach)
    • The extent of the problem (how widespread is the issue you are trying to address)
    • What is the relative importance of this problem (the significance of the issue to the field)
    • Where can I find more information (are there any books, websites, or other types of publications that I should consult)
    • A clear statement of the issues (this is called the problem statement—it should be a succinct and clear explanation of what the problem is)
• The relevant literature (this is the body of literature that you have selected to analyze—it should be as comprehensive as possible, but not so large that the review becomes unwieldy. Ideally, you will want to include everything published on the topic in the last five years. Inclusion of older material is acceptable if it provides unique insights into the topic)
• An organization scheme (this can be a simple bullet list or a very elaborate tree diagram—whatever makes your paper easy to follow)
  • A logical framework for the discussion (for example, if you are comparing two competing technologies and suggest that one is better than the other, you should provide evidence to support this claim. What are the key assumptions that you are making? What are the potential limitations of your analysis?
  • An appropriate level of detail (you should provide enough information to allow your readers to follow your argument, but not so much that they become overwhelmed)
  • A clear and correct citation of all sources (this step is crucial—you should make sure that all sources are cited correctly. An easy way to remember the proper format for citations is to use author, year, title, and page as the basic format—keep in mind that different disciplines may use different formats for citation. Some examples: an economics review might cite Karl Polanyi, The Great Transformation, 1956, while a psychology review might reference Daniel Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow, 2013
  • Limitations of the review (this is where you mention any limitations of your search strategy, the problem you are addressing, or the quality of the materials you have collected. For example, if you are writing a general review on the impact of social media on college students, you might mention that you only examined the use of social media in North America and did not include studies from other parts of the world where social media use might be prevalent but distinctively different (e.g., China vs. America)
  • A conclusion (your opinion of the problem you have examined—in other words, what is your ultimate solution to the problem? What are you suggesting that others do?

When you have completed your review, you will have a solid foundation for the next stage of your academic career. Your professor will appreciate your effort, and you will certainly have learned a great deal about the topic you have chosen!