How to Write a Literature Review for your Final Project

Writing a good literature review is very important for your dissertation. It may seem like an unnecessary part of the dissertation because the real focus of the dissertation is what you discovered through your research, but in reality it is an essential part. The literature review part of the dissertation exists to help explain the current understanding of the topic you are writing about. The point of the literature review is to explain the baseline knowledge that you are trying to add to.

It is often said that education is done by standing on the shoulders of giants, because we have the advantage of already knowing the things people before us discovered. We use their knowledge to discover even more things and move humanity’s knowledge further. That’s what the literature review in your dissertation is used for - it tells people why your research is important.

It is also very important at the approval stage. The panel needs to see that what you are doing will end up increasing our knowledge of the subject, and for that they need to know what the currently accepted views and theories are in the domain of your topic.

Where to Start?

One major reason that literature review are so difficult to write is the sheer amount of literature available on the topic. If you choose a topic which has hundreds of books written about it, how do you review all of them? It would be impossible to do so. Well, here is a tip from the best dissertation writing services on how they write literature reviews. A very simple way to discover some of the most important topics to cover is to read other people’s literature review.

Look at people who did research similar to you a year ago and you will know what type of literature you need to review. You should never plagiarize anything but you will get an idea about where you should start. Another advantage of taking this approach is that you get to know more about the latest knowledge about your chosen topic, which is necessary if you want to make sure that your dissertation brings something new to the table.

How Much Literature Needs to be Reviewed?

There is no standard for the number of researches and books you need to review when writing the literature review. What you should focus on instead is the topics and discoveries you will be covering in your literature review. Simply list down all the things you will be covering in the literature review. This list should contain all the information and theories that you will be using in your dissertation.

Once you know about all the things you need to cover in your literature review try to look for a few sources for every topic. Remember that you do not have to be very unique in your literature review. The objective of a literature review is to show the current understanding of your topic. If you are picking a very mainstream book because it is relevant to your dissertation there is nothing to worry about.

These are just some of the tips which will make it easier to write a literature review. Remember, if you ever get stuck in the dissertation, just read other dissertations. Reading other dissertations allows you to see how other people approached the problems you are now stuck at. It also puts your mind in the right flow - when you read a lot of dissertations it becomes easier for you to think about what you need to write in your own dissertation.