WHAT IS A REVIEW ARTICLE? WHY AND HOW DO WE WRITE IT? - HOW TO WRITE A REVIEW ARTICLE?
Zahira Bano
The review article also called published research tutorial article, published research results comparison article or research overview article, provides a critical and constructive analysis of previously published research, and it depicts the current thinking of the subject.
Definition of Review Paper:
A review article is the evaluation of someone else’s research or writing and often considered as secondary literature as it does not present new facts or figures from the original document.
Review article supports the arguments, and suggestions of the original research, and develops a better understanding of a particular topic. People usually write survey articles for a specific purpose or to target a certain group of audience. However, a non-expert can also build an understanding of a particular topic by reading a review article as it helps people to advance or improve their knowledge in an area of specialized research by reading just the findings and key points of it in a review. It does not promulgate new facts and figures or new experimental results, but it can recommend and highlight new areas of research, which can lead to new conclusions.
12 Steps to Write a Research Review Paper:
- Search a Topic, its need, and audience
- Conduct literature Research
- Start creating draft with citations
- Create tables of previously published research data
- Select the Review type you wish to write
- Focus on the objectives of the Review paper
- Try to write a Critical Review if possible
- Crosscheck quoted results in previous literature and cite them
- Write the abstract and proof-read it
- Send it to co-authors for their contribution
- Give journal-specific format to your review paper
- Submit it to the journal for peer review
How many words can be written in Review Paper Article?
There are not many journals that publish review articles as it is considered as secondary literature and a review paper could range from 8000 to 40000 words per article, depending upon the original document. However, some of the journals only publish review articles and solely dedicated to publishing it as it provides a comprehensive summary of research on a particular topic.
Types of Review Paper Article
Furthermore, review articles are of three types mainly, narrative, systematic, and tutorial reviews.
#1 Narrative review articles
Narrative review articles target a large group of audience (that may include non-experts or nonprofessionals) and hence written in a comparatively easy format than systematic review articles.
#2 Systematic Review Articles and their types
While on the other hand, systematic review articles contain a lot more detail about a particular topic than narrative review articles. It is a comprehensive review of the original published research. Systematic review articles are for a specific group of people because systematic review articles contain an in-depth analysis of a particular topic and this kind of paper is also known as a critical review paper. There are two types of systemic review articles. namely qualitative and quantitative reviews.
#3 Tutorial Review Paper Articles
Tutorial review paper research articles basically focus on ‘how to do’ stuff. Tutorial review papers explain how to prepare and achieve results with previously cited work and compare the methods in detail.
What do you need to Start Writing a Review Paper?
The fundamental reason for writing a review article is to provide readers or other researchers, the opportunity to create an understanding and update knowledge about a particular topic without digging deeper into the original research document. The importance of review articles is increasing day by day in the field of science and engineering. For instance, we can take the example of clinicians as they read review articles to update their knowledge, and it also helps them in formulating guidelines. That being the case, I think the review article can benefit in all fields as it provides a comprehensive analysis of previously published researches on a specific topic which can prove out to be extremely helpful for the potential reader.
How to Write a Literature Review Paper?
We will be discussing some of the main steps that are required to write a literature or review article. These steps are defined below.
#1 MAKING SURE OF JOURNAL’S OBJECTIVE AND REALM:
The first and foremost thing you have to keep in mind before proceeding with your review article is where you are going to publish your review article. You need to make sure that the journal you are looking forward to publishing your review article in, must accept articles for peer-review and publish those review articles, and you must know the aim, and scope of that journal. Otherwise, if you do not keep this in mind, then the chances are that you might get disappointed.
#2 DEFINING YOUR REALM (SCOPE):
Defining your scope means that you should compare and contrast. You must reveal gaps in the original research, which can help reach new conclusions through your review article. It can be helpful to identify areas that need more research, and it can also identify areas of agreement and disagreement.
#3 REVIEW TITLE and INCLUDING CITATIONs:
In this stage, you get to decide what is going to be the title of your research review. You must choose the title precisely as it will be the first thing your reader will see, and it will have an impact.
While writing a review paper, make sure to adopt the citation style of the specific journal where you intend to submit your review paper manuscript for publication.
Format of a Review Paper Article – Outline of Review Paper
#1 ABSTRACT OF YOUR REVIEW PAPER
Write a simplified and to the point summary of your Research Review Paper Article; that explains your contributions towards this research.
#2 INTRODUCTION OF YOUR TOPIC:
The introduction should be catchy and a simple linguistic approach must be used so that it can reach out to a large group of non-expert audiences. It is the section where the main subject of the article is defined, and it depicts the claim of the author. You can also highlight the importance of review, and the introduction must contain an overview of the concerned topic. A long intro appears dull, and the reader might not consider reading all of it, therefore your introduction must not be lengthy and be to the point. In the introduction, you should also highlight the key points upon which you are going to be discussing. Make sure that your introduction must provide a brief overview of the topic, and it must highlight the central points.
#3 WRITE THE MAIN BODY:
In the body, you need to assess how clear your article looks. In this section, you must discuss each of the main points of your review article separately and provide the supporting evidence while mooting how well does the given evidence supports the statements you quote. You can also mention your agreement or disagreement with the author’s claim, in this section.
#4 CRITICAL DELIBERATION:
Make sure to include an element of debate in your review article (if any contradictory research exists related to your area of focus) and discuss both dissents. You must include the author’s claim or evidence to support the argument. In this section, you can also reveal the gaps present in the original research, which can help reach new conclusions and can point out the areas that need a fix. Consider adding relevant citations and use journal-specific citation styles.
#5 CONCLUDE YOUR REVIEW ARTICLE:
In this section, you tend to restate the main points concisely and describe your overall opinion about the topic. You can briefly state the recommendations or suggest the areas of research. One important thing that you need to make sure of is that your conclusion must not be lengthy.
#6 PROOFREAD YOUR REVIEW ARTICLE:
Proofreading is essential. In this section, you must look for grammatical mistakes, punctuation mistakes, and spelling errors. You must check that all the information provided in the article is to the point or not, and you should exclude the irrelevant information.