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August 2, 2022
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August 2, 2022
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Recently Updated on January 13, 2025
A Guide to Writing a Dissertation Literature Review
Home > Blogs > A Guide to Writing a Dissertation Literature Review
August 2, 2022
Share Article
By
August 2, 2022
Share Article
Recently Updated on January 13, 2025
A Guide to Writing a Dissertation Literature Review
Completing and organising the literature review is one of the crucial stages of crafting the dissertation. It substantiates the existing knowledge of the research, indicates what has not been done, and stresses the contribution of the work undertaken. This guide will help you understand the scope of a literature review and advise you on how to handle the most frequent problems and write a good one. A good literature review for a dissertation provides the foundation for a well-structured and insightful academic work.
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Understanding the Purpose of a Dissertation Literature Review
A literature review describes, assesses, and synthesises the corpus of research. It critiques scholarship in a field and notes patterns, contrasts, and gaps that will be the focus of your work. In the case of a dissertation, the literature review allows you to put your research into perspective by:
Showing your knowledge of the topic.
Situating your activity within the scope of the previous research.
Setting up the theoretical and methodological context of the study.
Indicating deficiencies or gaps where more research is required.
It also justifies the significance and relevance of your research by indicating how you fill existing voids in the literature review for the dissertation. Knowing how to write literature reviews effectively is critical to showcasing the depth of your understanding.
Common Challenges Faced While Writing a Dissertation Literature Review
A literature review is difficult as, most of the time, one has to deal with a lot of information. Some of the issues in writing include:
Being Swamped with Information: The amount of material available concerning the literature is a lot more than one can handle and manage.
Lack of Self-Communication: A lot of time is spent planning, researching, analysing, and writing.
Critical Evaluation: This represents one of the challenges students face when analysing their sources – going beyond summary to offering a critical perspective.
Identifying Gaps: In order to recognise such gaps, one has to be familiar with the literature.
Maintaining Structure: Achieving all those objectives easily engages the reviewer in the most difficult task: ensuring structural/ logical coherence and cohesiveness.
When learning how to write a good literature review, addressing these challenges early can streamline the process.
How to Write a Literature Review?
Choosing a Topic and Defining Scope
You begin by defining the area of your research distinctly. What is the research problem that your dissertation seeks to answer? The scope should be manageable to avoid veering into tangentially related areas. Understanding how to write literature reviews for dissertation starts with clear topic selection.
Tips:
Use topic-related keywords such as "how to write literature reviews" whenever you are searching for information.
Be strategic in defining your scope to align with your dissertation's aims and objectives.
Conducting a Comprehensive Literature Search
A comprehensive critical literature submission entails a good comparative analysis of the work. In this regard, scholarly resources such as Google Scholar, JSTOR, and the university resources catalogue will be useful. Including diverse studies makes sure you are constructing the greatest literature review for your dissertation.
Steps for an Effective Search:
Develop a list of keywords and their synonyms.
Combine keywords and phrases with Boolean operators (AND, OR, NOT).
Quickly scan abstracts to find relevant research.
Analysing and Synthesizing the Literature
After the sources have been gathered, the next step is to go through them in such a way that they are analysed and synthesised as opposed to just being retold. It is important to learn how to write literature reviews effectively; one needs to integrate ideas across the available sources.
Key Questions to Ask While Evaluating Sources:
What is the author's main conclusion, hypothesis or claim?
Are there order's main perspectives, and if so, what order's main perspectives are there?
What are the approaches, methods, and sampling strategies, and are they effective?
And what are the gaps or limitations of the studies you have highlighted?
Analysing trends, identifying gaps, and understanding debates in the literature will make it easier to draft the best literature review for your dissertation.
Organising the Literature Review
A clear structure ensures a logical flow in your literature review for the dissertation. Common outlines include:
Chronological: advancement of events or developments in the field in focus.
Thematic: focusing on the recurrence of themes/subtopics in the studies
Methodological: the use of citations and studies, depending on various modes of research.
Theoretical: how the theories differ in the focus and approach of literature.
Choose the approach that best supports your research goals. Structuring is integral to writing a comprehensive and logical literature review.
Writing the Review
Introduction
The introduction sets the focus and objective of the literature review and gives readers an overview of the topic's scope, major themes, and relevance. Understanding how to write a literature review for a dissertation is critical for crafting a compelling introduction.
Example: "This review analyses the available literature on the effects of social networks on the mental health of youths, pinpointing self-esteem, anxiety, and social comparison as important components and identifying some issues that are going to be tackled in this study."
Main Body
In the main body, structure the studies logically while ensuring that coherence is maintained. Consolidate sources depending on the structure you have selected and skeptically compare their results. If you are still at a loss on how to write a good literature review, paying attention to how different sources relate to one another will do the trick.
Tips for a Strong Body:
Linking words (e.g., "however" and "moreover") must be used for better flow.
Disagreements and agreement positions of particular studies need to be outlined.
Avoid quoting others, and try to paraphrase or summarise instead- use quotes very rarely.
An Example of Critical Analysis would be:
"According to Smith (2020), social media induces anxiety by facilitating self-comparisons, whereas according to Jones (2021), while this is true, a person's resilience is a moderating factor. The authors of this review believe that the combination of these two approaches will improve the understanding of individual nuances concerning the psychological impact of social media on users".
Conclusion
The conclusion summarises the key findings and their implications. It also highlights how your research addresses identified gaps. Summarising effectively shows you know how to write literature reviews that are both critical and concise.
Example:
"In this review, it seems that a certain void has been left regarding the use of photo-sharing sites such as Instagram and its significance in this generation's mental make-up. This should change as this research will attempt to fill the gap that exists in the body of knowledge".
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Final Words
A short literature review is important to achieving a great dissertation. It demonstrates your grasp of the area, indicates the deficiencies in the work, and outlines the basis of your research. This guide will help you have a clear focus when writing a literature review that is comprehensive, evaluative, and, more importantly, interesting. With proper formulation, evaluation, and arrangement of ideas, it is possible to come up with the best literature review to enhance your journey in writing a dissertation.
Suppose you need further direction or want a professional's help. In that case, you can browse through Assignment Global to get expert Dissertation Help in writing a literature review for your dissertation. Understanding how to write a literature review for a dissertation ensures your work is impactful. Whether you are struggling with how to write literature reviews or aiming to craft the best literature review, expert guidance can make all the difference.
FAQs
How do I find sources for my literature review?
Dissertations, books, and peer-reviewed articles are the most prominent types of sources. Used keywords and abstracts of works to search for related ones.
What is the best structure for a literature review?
Common restructures comprise chronological, thematic, methodological, and theoretical. Select one that will assist you in achieving your research objectives.
Can you help locate the gaps in the literature?
Yes, we can help locate the gaps in your dissertation literature review by looking for fields that are not well addressed, data bodies that contradict each other in their findings, and even methodological weaknesses in some of the studies done.
How can your writer help to improve my literature review?
Our writers can help improve your literature by examining the sources, coherently structuring the content, and relating the discoveries to the objectives of your research.
