Step 2: The Literature Review —what has been done before? All research articles begin with a review of the other research that has taken place on this topic. A good literature review should:
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describe work done by other scholars, not just the author of the paper; and
mainly discuss articles from peer-reviewed journals.
The overall goal of the literature review is to provide the reader with an integrative summary of other research findings and the questions that remain unanswered or require additional research.
Reese and Cox begin their paper with a review of previous research on reading to children and identify research that is needed to determine how different reading styles impact children.