Literature Review

LITERATURE REVIEW ASSIGNMENT INSTRUCTIONSOVERVIEWThe purpose of this research project is for you to create a scholarly piece of graduate-level research and writing, which conforms to current APA format. Competency in the current APA format is required of all Business graduates of Liberty University, as set forth by policy of both the Graduate Faculty and the administration.INSTRUCTIONSYou will research and write a literature review on a topic relevant to your course. You will have approximately 7 modules to research and write the paper. At the beginning of Module 2: Week 2, your instructor will provide a list of approved topics for this assignment. Be sure to check the Announcement page and your email for the approved topics. Simply select a topic, and then begin working on the project. Do not recycle any work from any previous courses you have taken. Your research paper will be a comprehensive thematic review of the scholarly literature related to your topic.What is a literature review?A literature review discusses published information in a particular subject area, and sometimes information in a particular subject area within a certain time period.A literature review can be just a simple summary of the sources, but it usually has an organizational pattern and combines both summary and synthesis. A summary is a recap of the important information of the source, but a synthesis is a re-organization, or a reshuffling, of that information. It might give a new interpretation of old material or combine new with old interpretations. Or it might trace the intellectual progression of the field, including major debates. And depending on the situation, the literature review may evaluate the sources and advise the reader on the most pertinent or relevant.[i]How is a literature review different from an academic research paper?The main focus of an academic research paper is to develop a new argument, and a research paper will contain a literature review as one of its parts. In a research paper, you use the literature as a foundation and as support for a new insight that you contribute. The focus of a literature review, however, is to summarize and synthesize the arguments and ideas of others without adding new contributions.[ii] The academic research paper also covers a range of sources, but it is usually a select number of sources, because the emphasis is on the argument. Likewise, a literature review can also have an argument, but it is not as important as covering a number of sources. In short, an academic research paper and a literature review contain some of the same elements. In fact, many academic research papers will contain a literature review section. But it is the aspect of the study (the argument or the sources) that is emphasized that determines what type of document it is.