​ Step 1:

• Look at other literature reviews
• Choose a topic
  • Choose a topic that interests you
• Narrow your topic down
  • This is important to do otherwise the literature you find will be too massive 

Step 2:​

• Once you've narrowed your topic look for resources
  • You can look for books using the Library Search
  • Or look for articles in one of the Economics databases
    • ​Preferably in EconLit
  • AT FIRST--skim and scan by reading titles, abstracts, methodologies and review references or bibliographies. Only keep items related to your topic 
    • Once you have found books or articles that you feel relate to your topic, then do a "Citation Chase"
      • Do this by looking at the articles' or books' bibliographies or reference pages
        • Find sources from the reference papers that relate to your topic
        • Search for those items by typing in the titles in the University Libraries “Find It” box

​Step 3:

• Read and keep notes on each source
  • You could keep notes on index cards, in a special notebook, or by using an electronic device or app
    • I recommend keeping notes with Evernote because it is Open Source and once you create an account you can access it from any device
  • You may want to use a citation manager to organize all of your citations, there are many to choose from, here is a comparative list of some of the most popular. 
    • I recommend Zotero, again it is Open Source and accessible from anywhere

​​Step 4:

• Once you've collected, read, noted, and saved your citations and resources you should begin to see patterns
• ​​Skim your notes to sort out themes (methodologies, data, results, etc.) 
• In each theme are you noticing any chronological or structural order, if so, make note of that information
  • Does a topic develop over time 
  • Do authors agree with each other or disagree on methodology or conclusions
  • What strengths or weaknesses did you find in the literature
• Don't forget that you're trying to relate this literature to the story you wish to tell and you may find some of your articles fall out of your scope--make note of that to determine whether to mention them or not--talk to your professor about out of scope titles

Step 5:

• Write your literature review
  • Make an outline or structural form of your review
  • Remember your audience when writing
  • Avoid too much jargon
  • ​Be concise; don't go off on tangents; stay focused on your thesis statement
  • Introduction should contain some of the following:
    • Your purpose for writing the review
    • Overview of the problem
    • What is the scope of your review
    • Talk about the amount of literature you found
  • Body of the review should contain some of the following:
    • Themes
    • Chronological order
    • Advancements of theories 
    • Questions related to topic
  • Conclusion should contain some of the following:
    • Summarize your findings
    • Expose gaps in knowledge
    • Provide a rationale for future research
  • References in APA style

A literature review may consist of simply a summary of key sources, but it usually has an organizational pattern and combines both summary and synthesis, often within specific conceptual categories. 

• A summary is a recap of the important information of the source
• A synthesis is a re-organization, or a reshuffling, of that information in a way that informs how you are planning to investigate a research problem.

What is the purpose of a literature review?

• To demonstrate to your readers what you know about your topic
• To bring your readers up-to-date and fill them in on what has been published on your topic
• To allow you a better understanding of your topic