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Literature Reviews

An overview of conducting literature reviews in the social sciences and STEM fields.

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How to synthesize

In the synthesis step of a literature review, researchers analyze and integrate information from selected sources to identify patterns and themes. This involves critically evaluating findings, recognizing commonalities, and constructing a cohesive narrative that contributes to the understanding of the research topic.

Synthesis Not synthesis
✔️ Analyzing and integrating information ❌ Simply summarizing individual studies or articles
✔️ Identifying patterns and themes ❌ Listing facts without interpretation
✔️ Critically evaluating findings ❌ Copy-pasting content from sources
✔️ Constructing a cohesive narrative ❌ Providing personal opinions
✔️ Recognizing commonalities ❌ Focusing only on isolated details
✔️ Generating new perspectives ❌ Repeating information verbatim

Approaches to synthesis

Here are some examples of how to approach synthesizing the literature:

💡 By themes or concepts

🕘 Historically or chronologically

📊 By methodology

These organizational approaches can also be used when writing your review. It can be beneficial to begin organizing your references by these approaches in your citation manager by using folders, groups, or collections.


Create a synthesis matrix

A synthesis matrix allows you to visually organize your literature.

Topic: ______________________________________________

  Source #1 Source #2 Source #3 Source #4
Main idea A        
Main idea B        

⬇️

Topic: Chemical exposure to workers in nail salons

  Smith 2000 Gutierrez et al. 2015 Hansen 2018 Lee et al. 2014
Acrylate exposure and asthma "Participants reported multiple episodes of asthma over one year" (p. 58) etc...    
Formaldehyde exposure and contact dermatitis "Nail salon workers who did not wear gloves routinely reported increased episodes of contact dermatitis" (p. 115)