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How do I conduct a systematic literature review as opposed to a traditional narrative review?

I need to write a literature review chapter. My supervisor mentioned a "systematic" review, which sounds more rigorous. What are the concrete steps that differentiate it from just reading and summarizing papers?

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By Tom Kwon Answered 1 year ago

A systematic review is a primary research project of the existing literature. It requires a pre-registered protocol (on PROSPERO, for health sciences) specifying your question, inclusion/exclusion criteria, and search strategy. You then conduct exhaustive, reproducible searches across multiple databases (Scopus, Web of Science, PubMed, etc.), documenting every term. The screening of titles/abstracts and then full texts is done in duplicate by independent reviewers to minimize bias. Data from included studies is extracted into a standardized form. Finally, you synthesize findings narratively or, if appropriate, via meta-analysis. The goal is transparency, reproducibility, and minimizing bias—it answers the question: "What does all the evidence say?" It's labor-intensive but the gold standard for evidence synthesis.

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