{"id":382,"date":"2016-02-20T12:38:32","date_gmt":"2016-02-20T17:38:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/portal.clas.ufl.edu\/writing--wdkb-v1\/?p=382"},"modified":"2020-06-03T14:47:37","modified_gmt":"2020-06-03T18:47:37","slug":"writing-review-papers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/portal.clas.ufl.edu\/writing--wdkb-v1\/assignment\/writing-review-papers\/","title":{"rendered":"Writing Review Papers"},"content":{"rendered":"

“Review articles, including meta-analyses, are critical evaluations of material that has already been published. By organizing, integrating, and evaluating previously published material, the author of a review article considers the progress of current research toward clarifying a problem. —\u00a0APA Style Guide, 2001, 7, <\/small><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"471px-Vassily_Kandinsky,_1926_-_Several_Circles,_Gugg_0910_25\"What is a Review Paper?<\/strong>\u00a0 The APA guide goes on to say: “In a sense, a review article is tutorial in that the author\u00a0<\/span>defines and clarifies the problem;\u00a0summarizes previous investigations in order to inform the reader of the state of current research;\u00a0identifies relations, contradictions, gaps, and inconsistencies in the literature; and suggests the next step or steps in solving the problem.”<\/p>\n

It’s a forest and tree kind of situation: rather than reporting on a single study, the Review evaluates<\/strong> many studies in a research area with the intent of revealing a new or updated understanding<\/strong> of the field. \u00a0Review papers are syntheses of published texts; the synthesis itself is motivated by the writer’s point of view (POV) on the material. The POV drives the\u00a0review, and is reflected in the topical headings writers select.<\/p>\n

\"review_outline\"<\/a>
Content-driven reviews are organized using topical headings that indicate the writer’s POV<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

When is a Review\u00a0a “Literature Review”?<\/strong> \u00a0When a text synthesizes literature on a topic, but does not include original experimentation or evaluation, it is called a Literature Review. \u00a0Lit reviews can be stand-alone texts, and if you’ve been asked to write a “paper” about a topic, the most commonly expected form is the literature review, which has all of the parts of a Review paper except (usually) evaluation. To write this kind of paper, use all the parts of the Review paper material\u00a0except the stuff\u00a0about adding evaluation and making recommendations. (Lit reviews also play a role in research reports<\/a> and proposals<\/a> where the process of analysis and synthesis is the same, but the purpose of the lit review is quite different.)<\/p>\n

\"review<\/a>
Criteria-driven reviews include functional methods sections<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

For the WiDKB, we’ll use as our model Reviews as stand-alone publications (those published as articles in journals). Reviews combine functional headings (Introduction, Conclusion) with topical headings (headings that indicate content, a.k.a., the writer’s POV). Broadly speaking, reviews come in two flavors: criteria-driven<\/strong> and content-driven<\/strong>. Criteria-driven reviews feature a bibliography curated not only by topic, but by selection criteria at the level of the study itself — thus, a writer will\u00a0use only research reports that include control groups or a specific population or time period. Such\u00a0reviews include a functional Methods section that explains the search strategy. On their own, these reviews are called “systematic” because the final bibliography emerges from a combination of topic and selection criteria.\u00a0When the search yields studies that are similar enough methodologically, then statistical tests can be run on the published results themselves, yielding a level of insight not obvious from words alone; these are meta-analyses, and while a species of review, they are organized using all the functional subheadings, along with topical headings.<\/p>\n

\"Types_Review_Papers\"<\/p>\n

In college, the most common type of review assignment is a state of the art<\/strong> review: “A state-of-the-art review presents an up-to-date, interpretative synthesis of our knowledge of a certain subject or issue, with emphasis on the most recent literature. For example, an author might look at what is currently known about the advantages and disadvantages of a particular surgical method for mastectomy, or a particular chemotherapy regime in the treatment of breast cancer.” –“How and Why Biologists Write”, Writing Papers in the Biological Sciences<\/em>, McMillan, 2006, 114. \u00a0<\/small><\/p>\n

For our purposes, we’ll focus primarily on state-of-the-art reviews; nonetheless, the material can be used for any content-driven review. Where indicated, we’ll touch on systematic reviews, but will not be delving into the more complicated math-world of meta-analyses.<\/p>\n

Content<\/h4>\n