LITERATURE REVIEW

Literature review refers to the collection of scholarly information about any research problem/topic.

• It is a systematic gathering of information, analysing and reviewing documents from written or done by other scholars that have a relation to your problem being investigated.
• It is a requirement for any researcher to do a preliminary background search of information about a problem so that one discovers what has been done and what the gap in the field of study is.

This is one of the most important sections of the research proposal. It provides a discussion of literature that is related and relevant to the study. This section provides the researchers comprehensive perspective of all studies associated to the study at hand.

While writing your literature review section, always do a brief review of the existing literature, not a whole or comprehensive or full report. This section must be brief and on point.

While writing this section, you should always refer to the original source of literature, therefore if you find something of interest in a quotation, endeavor to find the original publication, by doing this you will minimize any forms of interpretation and reporting errors.

This chapter contains only one item, i.e. literature review.

Purpose of literature review

• To identify what is already known in your area of study.
• To justify why you need to study the problem you are interested in since it identifies the gaps.
• To orient the reader on how the research will be used to make discussion of the findings.
• To know what has been reported so that you report on what needs to be reported on.
• Forms part of the research process.

Classification of the Sources of Literature

The sources discussed above are classified into 3 main categories. These include;

1. Primary Sources; these are publications by the researcher that conducted the research. This is where we get the data from the first hand information especially the people who existed, observed and witnessed the occurrence of a certain event. For example Dissertation and Thesis, Conference papers among others.
2. Secondary Sources; these are publications by authors who are reporting the works of other researchers. These publishers did not directly participate in the research. This is where we get the literature from second hand information like published data, articles books, etc written by people/Authors who were not present when these events were happening.

Main Sources of Literature include

1. Conference papers, these are scholarly research papers presented in conferences.
2. Text books, researchers may use a computer based catalogue or a card catalogue to find a book of their choice. The catalogue is usually alphabetically indexed by Author, Subject and Title.
3. Dissertations and Thesis, this is original research work produced by a Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) or Master's degree candidate in partial fulfillment of the requirements for an award. These publications are of great value to a researcher.
4. Periodicals, this includes; magazines, newspapers and journals among other periodically published information.
5. Government Documents, these include government research reports, ministerial policy frameworks and policy papers among other documents of government.
6. The Internet or computer search, this entails the use of computers and other such facilities to browse the web and get the latest literature of interest.
7. Abstracts, these provide a list of journal articles with a summary of the document or text.
8. Reference Section of the library, this is a source of Literature where all books classified as reference material are catalogued in the same way within a library. This is done for easy access by researchers and scholars.

Importance of Reviewing Literature

1. The researcher develops a more comprehensive understanding of the study area, specifically the research problem and other variables.
2. It shows the relevance of earlier research to the present study.
3. It helps the researcher to avoid duplication.
4. It helps to reveal the contributions, weaknesses and gaps to be filled.
5. It helps in the identification and recognition of those who have already worked on the problem at hand.
6. Reviewing literature justifies the researcher's project.
7. Helps in discovering new variables relevant to the study.
8. Adequate literature review is a symptom of scholar or researcher academic maturity.
9. Reviewing literature as well helps the researcher to vividly know all the research projects related to his/her current project. The researcher will know all completed projects and those in the pipeline but this will only be limited to reported projects alone.
10. Reviewing literature equips the researcher with better explanations, theories, methods and ideas of research that are credible in studying and formulating the problem.
11. Reviewing literature provides alternative approaches to the research project.
12. Reviewing of literature helps to synthesizing facts about a given research area.

Main focus while reviewing literature

Researchers should always focus on the following 10 areas;

1. Self-Study Review, the researcher should ensure that the research work exhibits his/her high levels of familiarity with the research area. If well done, this will increase the confidence of both the researcher and the reviewer.
2. Actual Reviews, while reviewing literature the researcher should highlight specific arguments and doctrines in his/her current study through illustrating what has been done in the field, gaps (areas that need further study) and as well as weaknesses. The researcher should endeavor to organize this information "objective by objective".
3. Theoretical Reviews, while reviewing literature, the researcher should as well illustrate how different theories address an issue over time.
4. Historical Reviews, in the process of reviewing literature, the researcher should concentrate on tracing the developments of the research issue overtime.
5. Methodological Reviews, the research should ensure that his/her literature review sections illustrate how the methodology he/she has used varies with regards to the study.
6. Conceptual Reviews, the literature review section should as well illustrate the previous researcher's opinions and operationalization of your study variables.
7. Ongoing Reviews, your literature review section should be a discussion of current issues on the study area or what is known at that point in time. Avoid outdated literature.
8. Synopsis Review, your literature review must only provide a brief summary of the previous studies and must as well be concluded with a summary of literature you have reviewed.
9. Organizational Review, the researcher must review how other scholars have organized their literature and "pick a leaf" most especially if the institution your writing for does not have vivid guidelines.
10. Empirical Review, the researcher should ensure that he/she demonstrates thoroughness in the field of study by critically reviewing factual studies that have been done in similar or related studies.

The Literature Review Process

The process of reviewing literature and ultimately generating a literature review section is not linear in nature as many researchers think. This is usually one of the most cumbersome stages in the research process. However, if well understood, it may as well be one of the most interesting stages of the researcher process.

I have developed a simple model referred to as the FEM Literature Review Model to enable researchers appreciate the process of reviewing literature. In this model some of the connectors between phases are curved-upwards, downwards, side-ways and while as others are linear (Horizontal and Vertical). This is meant to show the researcher that the process of effectively reviewing literature is not as direct as most scholars presume. Therefore researchers that will persistently follow this model will actually find this process fascinating than cumbrous.

The FEM Literature Review Model

STEP 1: State your topic and list the key words or concepts or variables or constructs.

At this point the researcher is expected to have a research topic. Therefore, you state the title of your research, from the title you then identify the key words that will support in the process of searching for current valid literature. The variables of the study must as well be considered while stating the key words.

STEP 2: Search for current material related to your topic and constructs

After clearly stating your topic and key words in step 1 above, then conduct an exhaustive search for current, relevant and related literature. Use all possible sources of literature to get the necessary material. Scholars may use books, articles, abstracts, dissertations and reports among other documents in your areas of study.

Ensure that you plan for how long you expect to review literature or for the time you expect to utilize while reviewing literature.

STEP 3: Extract important fragment from the available material

Based on the material generated in step 2 above, then you should review the Books, Articles, Journals and abstracts among others that were collected in the previous stage. As you review these documents, any information found relevant should be captured immediately while citing the source of the information or author.

While reviewing documents focus on;

1. Definitions of terms by different scholars.
2. Findings, conclusions and recommendations of others scholars.
3. Areas for further studies, relevant to this cause.
4. Gaps in the literature (these may be directly observable or indirectly observable).
5. Any form of disagreements about the researcher constructs.

STEP 4: Chronologically compile your literature.

After all the 3 steps above, the researcher then starts organizing his or her literature in order of time of publication for example 2016 comes before 2012. And in order of relevancy implying that literature will as well be arranged in order of important and relatedness of information will as well be considered.

STEP 5: Scrutinize your literature

This step encourages the researcher to review the generated literature in Step 4 above, this is to ensure that the literature is free of technical and non-technical errors including errors attributed to citation.

STEP 6: Draft the literature review section

At this level, the researcher compiles the entire literature review section and ensures that you have a draft version of this section.

STEP 7: Synopsize the literature review section.

The researcher should now generate a brief summary of his/her literature review section. This summary should reflect the gaps in the reviewed literature, controversial agreements and as well as any key lessons learnt.

STEP 8: Consolidate your Literature Review section

This is the final step and at this level the researcher is expected to harmonize the entire section and probably combining this section with other completed sections of the research proposal.

Types of Reviews

1. Theoretical Review. This entails the review of the theory (ies) that underpin the study. The researcher will elucidate the theory and illustrate how other scholars have used the theory or theories underpinning the study.
2. Procedural review. This entails the researcher analyzing how methodology varies by studies and this definitely guides the methodology to be adopted by the current research/ study.
3. Historical review. Adopting this form of review enables the researcher to trace the advancement of an issue or research problem over time. The researcher will therefore keenly review how a given phenomenon has evolved over a given period of time. A comprehensive historical review will enable the researcher to generate a good justification, problem statement and historical background of the study.
4. Self-boost review. This form of review is specifically done to boost the researcher's comprehension, familiarity and knowledge about his/her research study. Therefore this form of study upgrades the researcher's self-confidence specifically about the study.
5. Conceptual review. This is done by the researcher to find out or discover more about his or her study variables. Conducting this form of review will support the researcher to develop a good conceptual background and the content scope of the study. This must as well be directly linked to the conceptual framework of the study.
6. Contextual review. This form of review enables the researcher to vividly understand the case of the study or unit of analysis. You will understand "What" or "Who" is being studied and why this specific unit and the history of the problem in this chosen unit of analysis. This form of review will support the researcher in the development of the contextual review section and the geographical scope of the study.

Writing the Chapter Two Section

(Note: The title "CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW" should not be included in your Chapter Two text itself, but as a researcher you should know that under this section you start the actual review of literature objective by objective.)

The sub-headings under this Section should be based on the number of specific objectives of the study. Therefore each sub-heading must be given a title that represents the independent variable and dependent variable of the study.

This section should highlight specific arguments, gaps, weaknesses and contributions by earlier researchers and as well as ideas in a given combination of variables of the study. Endeavor to discuss relevant, current (not too old literature) and related literature under each of the themes.

This section is only valid if it has more than enough citations in the text. Basing on the policies of the institutions, while citing the researcher must include the author and the year of publication. However, that is incumbent upon the referencing style and policy of the institution. According to UHPAB, include a minimum of 20 references.

2.1 Specific Objective 1 (One) - "Restated as a title"

Under this section, specific objective 1 (one) should be restated as a title in the form "Independent Variable 1 and the Dependent Variable" (IV1 & DV). Therefore the title of this section should be "2.1 Hospital related challenges that affect performance of diploma student nurses and midwives in clinical practice."

Discuss literature on the subject with the motive of bringing to light the contributions made by other researchers, gaps in existing literature, weaknesses and as well as emerging ideas.

2.2 Specific Objective 2 (Two) - "Restated as a title"

Under this section, specific objective 2 (Two) should be restated as a title in the form "Independent Variable 2 and the Dependent Variable" (IV2 & DV). Therefore the title of this section should be "2.2 Individual student, relate challenges that affect performance of diploma student nurses and midwives in clinical practice."

Discuss literature on the subject with the motive of bringing to light the contributions made by other researchers, gaps in existing literature, weaknesses and as well as emerging ideas.

Whenever you are writing someone’s work, you have to acknowledge the person who did the work, and in research, we call that REFERENCING. This will be covered under References.