A) A Process

A literature review is a survey of the scholarly literature published on a given issue, research topic, or theory. Rather than providing a new research insight, a literature review lays the groundwork for an in-depth research project analyzing previous research. Type of documents surveyed will vary depending on the field, but can include:

• books
• journal articles
• theses
• dissertations

A thorough literature review will also require surveying what librarians call "gray literature," which includes difficult-to-locate documents such as:

• technical reports
• government publications
• working papers
• preprints

B) A Product

A literature review is also the component of your assignment, article, or other academic work which synthesizes what you found in your research; it provides a description, summary, and critical evaluation of each work.  Your literature review should include:

• major findings & trends
• interpretation & evaluation (do not just list all the research articles you found)
• current knowledge gaps
• how your research fits in to the existing literature

• Determine the research problem
• Avoid useless approaches
• Identify methods of future research
• Find new lines of inquiry
• Gain methodological insight

• Distinguishing what has been done from what needs to be done
• Discovering important variables relevant to the topic
• Synthesizing and gaining new perspective
• Identifying relationships between ideas and practices
• Establishing the context of the topic
• Rationalizing the significance of the problem
• Enhancing and acquiring subject vocabulary
• Understanding the structure of the subject
• Relating ideas and theory to applications
• Identifying main methodologies and research techniques that have been used
• Placing research in a historical context to show familiarity with state-of-art development

• What is the overarching question or problem your literature review seeks to address?
• How much familiarity do you already have with the field? Are you already familiar with common methodologies or professional vocabularies?
• What types of strategies or questions have others in your field pursued?
• How will you synthesize or summarize the information you gather?
• What do you or others perceive to be lacking in your field?
• Is your topic broad? How could it be narrowed?
• Can you articulate why your topic is important in your field?