What should you do before starting to write a literature review for a dissertation?

As a literature review is one of the most essential sections of an effective dissertation therefore it has to be written with extreme care and effectiveness. There are a lot of steps which can be taken during the writing process of this chapter but what people do not usually tend to realize is that several things have to be done even before starting the chapter. You may think that only excellent writing skills are required to complete this chapter effectively on the contrary reading critically is the key to completing this chapter.  The primary task you have to do before you can start the chapter is to select the most relevant and recent literature from reliable sources and in order to do this skim through the abstracts and overviews to determine whether a specific piece of literature is valuable for the chapter otherwise discard it. Once you have selected an ample amount of sources start reading them one by one and create a virtual map or outline in your mind regarding the analysis and discussion of these sources in the chapter. Look at the strengths and weaknesses of various researches and identify how a specific research relates to your own research. Once you have done all of this and prepared an outline you are well on your way to successfully completing a very good review of literature for your dissertation.

What are the components of a high quality literature review?

One of the most important chapters of a dissertation is the literature review. The literature review chapter has high priority because of the weighting of this chapter with respect to the number of words and the overall grade. A dissertation may be awarded a distinction or may be rejected mainly due to the quality of the review of literature. The Literature Review chapter covers a critical review of various studies and researches conducted in the past which are relevant to the research area of the dissertation. It should be kept in mind while writing this chapter that a critical perspective is required and not just an explanation of the various theories and concepts found in different sources of literature. Another important aspect to consider is the relevancy, recentness and reliability of the literature being reviewed. The literature review can only be written in high quality if it is critical in nature and the most recent, reliable and relevant sources are used.