Are you ready to carry out a knowledge synthesis project such as a systematic review, meta-analysis, or scoping review? Remember that systematic reviews require:
If you're unsure what type of knowledge synthesis best suits your research purposes, follow along this flowchart or complete this short quiz to find your personalized review methodologies: https://whatreviewisrightforyou.knowledgetranslation.net/
Reproduced from "What type of review could you write?" Yale Medical Library.
Conducting effective reviews is essential to advance the knowledge and understand the breadth of research on a topic; synthesize existing evidence; develop theories or provide a conceptual background for subsequent research; and identify research gaps. However, there are over 100 different kinds of reviews to choose from. The following provides a comparison of common review types.
Review Type |
Description |
Search |
Appraisal |
Synthesis |
Analysis |
Literature review |
Generic term: published materials that provide an examination of recent or current literature. Can cover a wide range of subjects at various levels of completeness and comprehensiveness. May include research findings |
May or may not include comprehensive searching |
May or may not include quality assessment |
Typically narrative |
Analysis may be chronological, conceptual, thematic, etc. |
Systematic review |
Seeks to systematically search for, appraise and synthesize research evidence, often adhering to guidelines on the conduct of a review |
Aims for exhaustive, Comprehensive searching |
Quality assessment may determine inclusion/exclusion |
Typically narrative with tabular accompaniment |
What is known; recommendations for practice. What remains unknown; uncertainty around findings, recommendations for future research |
Meta-analysis |
Technique that statistically combines the results of quantitative studies to provide a more precise effect of the results
|
Aims for exhaustive searching. May use funnel plot to assess completeness
|
Quality assessment may determine inclusion/exclusion and/or sensitivity analyses
|
Graphical and tabular with narrative commentary
|
Numerical analysis of measures of effect assuming absence of heterogeneity
|
Scoping review |
Preliminary assessment of potential size and scope of available research literature. Aims to identify the nature and extent of research evidence (usually including ongoing research) |
Completeness of searching determined by time/scope constraints. May include research in progress |
No formal quality assessment |
Typically tabular with some narrative commentary |
Characterizes quantity and quality of literature, perhaps by study design and other key features. Attempts to specify a viable review |
Mixed studies review/mixed methods review |
Refers to any combination of methods where one significant component is a literature review (usually systematic). Within a review context, it refers to a combination of review approaches for example combining quantitative with qualitative research or outcome with process studies |
Requires either very sensitive search to retrieve all studies or separately conceived quantitative and qualitative strategies |
Requires either a generic appraisal instrument or separate appraisal processes with corresponding checklists |
Typically both components will be presented as narrative and in tables. May also employ graphical means of integrating quantitative and qualitative studies |
Analysis may characterize both works of literature and look for correlations between characteristics or use gap analysis to identify aspects absent in one literature but missing in the other |
Umbrella review |
Specifically refers to review compiling evidence from multiple reviews into one accessible and usable document. Focuses on a broad condition or problem for which there are competing interventions and highlights reviews that address these interventions and their results |
Identification of component reviews, but no search for primary studies |
Quality assessment of studies within component reviews and/or of reviews themselves
|
Graphical and tabular with narrative commentary |
What is known; recommendations for practice. What remains unknown; recommendations for future research |
Reproduced from Grant, M. J., & Booth, A. (2009). A typology of reviews: an analysis of 14 review types and associated methodologies. Health Information & Libraries Journal, 26(2), 91-108. DOI: 10.1111/J.1471-1842.2009.00848.X