WRT333

Review Articles

Syllabus | Table of Pages

Primary and Secondary Literature: Original observations, the conclusions drawn from them, and the reasoning holding data and conclusions together form the subject matter of the scientific journal article, and collectively this material constitutes the primary literature. For the most part, authors seek journals as the main way to have a paper recognized as part of the permanent scientific primary literature.

Scientists also write about the work of other scientists. This is sometimes done in the context of original research, in which literature is used as a basis for posing the questions or problem statements of an introduction, as a reference for methods, or as a foil against which results can be contrasted, perhaps changing the collective perspective in a breakthough of new insight. But when the principle purpose of a paper is to consider the work others have published in the primary literature, the paper is classified as a review article, and the literature into which it falls constitutes the secondary literature, or writing about literature. (Montgomery, 2003)

Most students are familiar with review articles. They are, when written by a student, the usual term paper. The purpose of a good review article is congruent with that of most term papers: to review published papers from the point of view of a clearly articulated context. The review is not an original publication in the sense that it does not (usually) contain any new information or data by the author.

Reviews tend to be lengthy and general. Because their primary intent is to organize literature and place it in a context, they feature extensive lists of references, dozens or more. They are not, however, intended to be mere extensive bibliographic lists, adorned with annotations. The best reviews evaluate and seek to provide insight.

Review papers seldom follow an IMRAD format, although there may be a methods section telling how the literature was selected or evaluated. Rather, reviews can be considered as an expanded introduction, no methods or results, and an expanded discussion (Day 1998). What matters isn't the format, however, so much as the organization. A good review follows a carefully constructed outline. That is, because it is goal-oriented and pursues a central thesis (or set of related theses), the review has a limited scope, and that scope needs to be stated clearly. An outline may actually be printed at the beginning of the review.

A review may be written in an effort to discuss a significant part of the extant literature, or it may be written to use the literature as part of a critical, well-stated argument. It may or may not follow a chronological order, depending on whether its primary purpose is historical, which is less common today. In rapidly moving fields, it may only include relatively recent literature, serving to help readers keep up with an influx of disparate and time-demanding literature; it may also be a review of literature dating from the time of a previous review, again with a goal of serving a reader seeking an expedient scan of many papers.

The audience for a review article is inherently more general than that for the primary literature. People who read reviews include those who are expanding their awareness of developments in areas related to a (typically narrow) field of specialization. The audience also may include students or other generalists attempting to grasp a broad set of recent scientific reports. This calls for writing that is explanatory, with terms defined, and with particular care to avoid specialized language uses. Note, too, that the introduction is going to be used by readers as a mechanism to anticipate content, with an eye to deciding whether to read further, meaning that it should be written with full intent to be comprehensive of what follows. In character with its nature as a vehicle for critique, a good review may also take a position on the literature, providing perspective and criticism, and drawing conclusions.

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