Literature Review
- Steps for Conducting a Lit Review
- Finding "The Literature"
- Organizing/Writing
- Sample Literature Reviews
- FAMU Writing Center
Sample Lit Reviews from Communication Arts
- Literature Review Sample 1
- Literature Review Sample 2
- Literature Review Sample 3
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- Last Updated: Oct 20, 2022 11:24 AM
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- Specific Examples/Applications of APA Style, 7th edition
Sample APA-Style Papers (7th edition)
The following links provide samples of student-paper formatting in APA's 7th edition style. The first is from APA's web site; the second is from Purdue OWL's web site.
- Sample APA Student Paper This document from the APA web site illustrates the 7th edition formatting of a student paper. This format is a simplified version of the professional paper format (excluding things like running heads, etc.).
- Purdue OWL Sample Student Paper This sample student paper in APA 7th edition comes from PurdueOWL. It can be used to supplement the example from the APA web site, or stand on its own.
The following links provide samples of professional-paper formatting in APA's 7th edition style. The first is from APA's web site; the second is from Purdue OWL's web site. The formatting of these professional papers is a bit more involved than that of the student sample papers.
- Sample APA Professional Paper This sample professional paper from the APA web site illustrates the 7th edition formatting for a paper submitted for publication to a professional journal.
- Purdue OWL Sample Professional Paper This sample paper from Purdue OWL illustrates in 7th edition formatting a professional paper. It can be used to supplement the APA sample paper or it can stand alone.
Quotations and Paraphrases in APA Style (7th edition)
- Quotations (APA 7th Edition) This link takes you to a page on the official APAstyle.org web site with information that includes how to cite both direct and indirect quotations (short and long), how to cite material for direct quotations that do not contain page numbers, and more.
- Quotations--PurdueOWL (APA 7th edition) On this "Basics: In-Text Citations" page from PurdueOWL, scroll down to see explanations and example for quotations both short (under 40 words) and long (40+ words). In addition, it gives guidance about paraphrases/summaries and how to use in-text citations to document their original source(s).
Formatting an Annotated Bibliography in APA Style (7th edition)
- Purdue Online Writing Lab (OWL): Annotated Bibliographies This helpful page from PurdueOWL explains the purpose of annotated bibliographies, what they often contain, and why they're helpful.
- Guidelines for Formatting Annotated Bibliographies (APA, 7th ed.) This document provides guidance for formatting annotated bibliographies, including a sample annotated bib.
Formatting a Literature Review in APA Style (7th edition)
While APA doesn't itself provide an example of how to format a literature review, it does provide some guidance in its Publication Manual * about the content of a lit review:
Literature Reviews:
- provide summaries and evaluations of findings/theories in the research literature of a particular discipline or field;
- may include qualitative, quantitative, or a variety of other types of research;
- should define and clarify the problem being reviewed;
- summarize previous research to inform readers of where research stands currently in regard to the problem;
- identify relationships, contradictions, gaps, and inconsistencies in the current literature;
- suggest next steps or further research needed to move toward solving the problem. (APA, 2020, Section 1.6, p. 8)
* American Psychological Association. (2020). Publication manual of the American Psychological Association: The official guide to APA style (7th ed.). American Psychological Association.
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Literature Reviews
The literature of a literature review is not made up of novels and short stories and poetry—but is the collection of writing and research that has been produced on a particular topic.
The purpose of the literature review is to give you an overview of a particular topic. Your job is to discover the research that has been done, the major perspectives, and the significant thinkers and writers (experts) who have published on the topic you’re interested in. In other words, it’s a survey of what has been written and argued about your topic.
By the time you complete your literature review you should have written an essay that demonstrates that you:
- Understand the history of what’s been written and researched on your topic.
- Know the significance of the current academic thinking on your topic, including what the controversies are.
- Have a perspective about what work remains to be done on your topic.
Thus, a literature review synthesizes your research into an explanation of what is known and what is not known on your topic. If the topic is one from which you want to embark on a major research project, doing a literature review will save you time and help you figure out where you might focus your attention so you don’t duplicate research that has already been done.
Just to be clear: a literature review differs from a research paper in that a literature review is a summary and synthesis of the major arguments and thinking of experts on the topic you’re investigating, whereas a research paper supports a position or an opinion you have developed yourself as a result of your own analysis of a topic.
Another advantage of doing a literature review is that it summarizes the intellectual discussion that has been going on over the decades—or centuries—on a specific topic and allows you to join in that conversation (what academics call academic discourse) from a knowledgeable position.
The following presentation will provide you with the basic steps to follow as you work to complete a literature review.
Seeing a sample literature review can be a helpful way to get started. Click on the image below to open a PDF of a sample literature review written according to APA 7 th edition guidelines.
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