Chapter Three

Reviewing the
Literature
Mark Brian G. Pila
 One of the essential preliminary tasks when you undertake a
research study is to go through the existing literature in order to
acquaint yourself with the available body of knowledge in your
area of interest.
 The higher the academic level of your research, the more
important a thorough integration of your findings with existing
literature becomes.
 A literature review has the following functions:
 It provides a theoretical background to your study.
 It helps you establish the links between what you are proposing to
examine and what has already been studied.
 It enables you to show how your findings have contributed to the
existing body of knowledge in your profession.
 It helps you to integrate your research findings into the existing body
of knowledge.
 In relation to your own study, the literature review can help in
four ways. It can:

 Bring clarity and focus to your research problem;

 Improve your research methodology;
 Broaden your knowledge base in your research area; and
 Contextualize your findings.
Bringing clarity and focus to
your research problem
 When reviewing the literature you learn what aspects of your
subject area have been examined by others, what they have
found out about these aspects, what gaps they have identified
and what suggestions they have made for further research. All
these will help you gain a greater insight into your own research
questions and provide you with clarity and focus which are
central to a relevant and valid study. In addition, it will help you
to focus your study on areas where there are gaps in the existing
body of knowledge, thereby enhancing its relevance.
Improving your research
methodology
 A literature review tells you if others have used procedures and
methods similar to the ones that you are proposing, which
procedures and methods have worked well for them and what
problems they have faced with them. By becoming aware of any
problems and pitfalls, you will be better positioned to select a
methodology that is capable of providing valid answers to your
research question.
Broadening your knowledge
base in your research area
 It is important that you know what other researchers have found
in regard to the same or similar questions, what theories have
been put forward and what gaps exist in the relevant body of
knowledge. Another important reason for doing a literature
review is that it helps you to understand how the findings of your
study fit into the existing body of knowledge.
Enabling you to contextualize
your findings
 Obtaining answers to your research questions is comparatively
easy: the difficult part is examining how your findings fit into the
existing body of knowledge. How do answers to your research
questions compare with what others have found? What
contribution have you been able to make to the existing body of
knowledge? How are your findings different from those of others?
Undertaking a literature review will enable you to compare your
findings with those of others and answer these questions. It is
important to place your findings in the context of what is already
known in your field of enquiry.
How to review the literature
 There is a danger in reviewing the literature without having a
reasonably specific idea of what you want to study. It can
condition your thinking about your study and the methodology
you might use, resulting in a less innovative choice of research
problem and methodology than otherwise would have been the
case. Hence, you should try broadly to conceptualize your
research problem before undertaking your major literature
review.
 There are four steps involved in conducting a literature review:
 Searching for the existing literature in your area of study.
 Reviewing the selected literature.
 Developing a theoretical framework.
 Developing a conceptual framework.
Searching for the existing
literature
 To search effectively for the literature in your field of enquiry, it
is imperative that you have at least some idea of the broad
subject area and of the problem you wish to investigate, in order
to set parameters for your search. Next, compile a bibliography
for this broad area.
 There are three sources that you can use to prepare a
bibliography:
 books
 journals
 the Internet
Reviewing the selected
literature
 Now that you have identified several books and articles as useful,
the next step is to start reading them critically to pull together
themes and issues that are of relevance to your study. Unless you
have a theoretical framework of themes in mind to start with, use
separate sheets of paper for each theme or issue you identify as
you go through selected books and articles.
 Once you develop a rough framework, slot the findings from the
material so far reviewed into these themes, using a separate
sheet of paper for each theme of the framework so far developed.
As you read further, go on slotting the information where it
logically belongs under the themes so far developed. Keep in
mind that you may need to add more themes as you go along.
Developing a theoretical
framework
 The information obtained from different books and journals now
needs to be sorted under the main themes and theories,
highlighting agreements and disagreements among the authors
and identifying the unanswered questions or gaps. You will also
realize that the literature deals with a number of aspects that
have a direct or indirect bearing on your research topic. Use these
aspects as a basis for developing your theoretical framework.
Literature pertinent to your study may deal with two types of
information: universal and more specific. In writing about such
information you should start with the general information,
gradually narrowing it down to the specific.
Developing a conceptual
framework
 The conceptual framework is the basis of your research problem.
It stems from the theoretical framework and usually focuses on
the section(s) which become the basis of your study. Whereas the
theoretical framework consists of the theories or issues in which
your study is embedded, it describes the aspects you selected
from the theoretical framework to become the basis of your
enquiry. The conceptual framework is focused on indicators to
measure the success or failure of the strategies to enhance
community responsiveness. Hence the conceptual framework
grows out of the theoretical framework and relates to the specific
research problem.
Writing about the literature
reviewed
 As mentioned in the beginning of this chapter, two of the broad functions of a literature
review are (1) to provide a theoretical background to your study and (2) to enable you to
contextualize your findings in relation to the existing body of knowledge in addition to
refining your methodology.
 In order to fulfil the first purpose, you should identify and describe various theories
relevant to your field; and specify gaps in existing knowledge in the area, recent
advances in the area of study, current trends and so on. In order to comply with the
second function you should integrate the results from your study with specific and
relevant findings from the existing literature by comparing the two for confirmation or
contradiction.
 The second broad function of the literature review is contextualizing the findings of your
study, this requires you to compare very systematically your findings with those made
by others. Quote from these studies to show how your findings contradict, confirm or
add to them. It places your findings in the context of what others have found out
providing complete reference in an acceptable format. This function is undertaken, as
mentioned earlier, when writing about your findings, that is after analysis of your data.