CHAPTER II:
RRL
Research I
REVIEW OF RELATED
LITERATURE AND
STUDIES
01 WHAT IS RRL
REVIEW OF RELATED
LITERATURE
WHAT IS IT
A literature review is an account of what has been published on a topic
by accredited scholars and researcher.
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 that you
can later apply to your paper, thesis, or dissertation topic.
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.
RRL
A LITERATURE REVIEW MUST DO THESE THINGS:
• be organized around and related directly to the thesis or research
question you are developing
• synthesize results into a summary of what is and is not known
• identify areas of controversy in the literature
• formulate questions that need further research
RRL
PURPOSE:
• Demonstrate your familiarity with the topic and its scholarly context
• Develop a theoretical framework and methodology for your research
• Position your work in relation to other researchers and theorists
• Show how your research addresses a gap or contributes to a debate
• Evaluate the current state of research and demonstrate your
knowledge of the scholarly debates around your topic.
HOW TO WRITE
02 AN RRL
STEPS IN WRITING THE RRL
Search for relevant Outline your literature
01 literature
04 review’s structure
Evaluate and select Write your literature
02 sources
05 review
Identify themes, debates,
03 and gaps
1. Search for relevant literature
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
problem and questions.
1. Search for relevant literature
Make a list of keywords
Start by creating a list of keywords related to your research question.
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 as you discover
new keywords in the process of your literature search.
1. Search for relevant literature
Literature review research question example:
What is the impact of social media on body image among Generation Z?
Keywords example
Social media, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, TikTok
Body image, self-perception, self-esteem, mental health
Generation Z, teenagers, adolescents, youth
1. Search for relevant literature
Search for relevant sources
Use your keywords to begin searching for sources. Some useful
databases to search for journals and articles include:
• Google Scholar
• JSTOR
• EBSCO
• Project Muse (humanities and social sciences)
• Medline (life sciences and biomedicine)
• EconLit (economics)
• Inspec (physics, engineering and computer science)
Search for relevant sources
You can also use Boolean operators
to help narrow down your search.
1. Search for relevant literature
Search for relevant sources
NOTE:
Make sure to 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.
2. Evaluate and select sources
You likely won’t be able to read absolutely everything that has been
written on your topic, so it will be necessary to evaluate which sources
are most relevant to your research question.
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?
2. Evaluate and select sources
• 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?
• 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.
2. Evaluate and select sources
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 is important to keep track of your sources with citations to avoid
plagiarism. It can be helpful to make an annotated bibliography, where
you compile full citation 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.
3. Identify themes, debates, and
gaps
To begin organizing your literature review’s argument and structure, be
sure you 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?
3. Identify themes, debates, and
gaps
• 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??
3. Identify themes, debates, and
gaps
Example of trends and gaps
In reviewing the literature on social media and body image, you note
that:
• 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.
4. Outline your literature review’s
structure
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 summarizing sources in order.
Try to analyze patterns, turning points and key debates that have shaped
the direction of the field. Give your interpretation of how and why certain
developments occurred.
4. Outline your literature review’s
structure
Thematic
If you have found some recurring central themes, you can organize 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.
4. Outline your literature review’s
structure
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
4. Outline your literature review’s
structure
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.
5. Write your literature review
Introduction
The introduction should clearly establish the focus and purpose of the
literature review.
Tip
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 emphasize 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”).
5. Write your literature review
Body
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, you can follow these tips:
• 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
5. Write your literature review
Body
• Critically evaluate: mention the strengths and weaknesses of your
sources
• Write in well-structured paragraphs: use transition words and topic
sentences to draw connections, comparisons and contrasts
5. Write your literature review
Conclusion
In the conclusion, you should summarize the key findings you have taken
from the literature and emphasize their significance.
Tip
Be sure to show 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.
CONCEPTUAL
03 FRAMEWORK
CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK
A conceptual framework is a representation of the relationship you
expect to see between your variables, or the characteristics or properties
that you want to study.
A conceptual framework shows the relationship between the variables of
your study. It includes a visual diagram or a model that summarizes the
concepts of your study and a narrative explanation of the model
presented.
Conceptual frameworks can be written or visual and are generally
developed based on a literature review of existing studies about your
topic.
A. Independent-Dependent
Variable Model
You may create this model by writing the independent and dependent
variables inside rectangles. Then, insert a line segment between them,
connecting the rectangles. This line segment indicates the direct
relationship between these variables.
B. Input-Process-Output (IPO)
Model
1. Determine the inputs of your study. Inputs are the variables you will
use to arrive at your research result. Usually, your independent
variables are also the inputs of your research. Let’s say your research
is about the Level of Satisfaction of College Students with the Use of
Google Classroom as an Online Learning Platform. You may include in
your inputs the profile of your respondents and the curriculum used
in the online learning platform.
B. Input-Process-Output (IPO)
Model
2. Outline your research process. Using our example above, the
research process should be like this: Data collection of student
profiles → Administering questionnaires → Tabulation of students’
responses → Statistical analysis of data.
3. State the research output. Indicate what you are expecting after you
conduct the research. In our example above, the research output is
the assessed level of satisfaction of college students with the use of
Google Classroom as an online learning platform.
4. Create the model using the determined input, process, and output of
the research.
B. Input-Process-Output (IPO)
Model
C. Concept Map
A concept map is an effective visual diagram if you have multiple
variables that affect one another. Let’s say your research is about Coping
with the Remote Learning System: Anxiety Levels of College Students.
Presented below is the concept map for the research’s conceptual
framework: