i have just started my phd. i was just wondering if anyone had some advice about how to appraoch a literature review?? what exactly is it and how do u go about doing one?? help!

A literature review is just an overview of what is currently known in your particular subject. The best place to start is a search on one of the web based databases like Web of Science. Also your supervisor should be a good source to get a few papers to start you off.

One of my course last year was a Lit review and i'm currently doing another one as part of my project. A good way to go about it is to work out 'keywords' for your project e.g. from reading a general textbook, then use these to search PubMed, Science Direct, BiomedCentral etc as these offer plenty of full text articles, including reviews. I've got a feeling the mimas WOS ,mentioned above will just give you references rather than full text. Hope this helps.

Dear andy,
literature review means searching for all what have been done in the respective field.To start with u can go to bmn.com and search for the reviews there, from here u can get the key words in which u r interested. Then u can go to pubmed, medline,sciencedirect or the specific journal searches as PNAS,JBC,Biochemistry and like that.

How did you manage to get on a PhD & not know what a literature review is? It drives me mad how some of us are flogging away trying to get on one & others seem to just land on their feet! :o/ It's such a lottery!

Tell me about it! It stuns me when I see some of the people that manage to get on one! They must be pretty hot at talking about themselves or something, I've seen many a PhD student whose lab skills are pretty poor!

rise of the green eyed monster is a sad thing!

Yeh - dude you should know what a literature review is.

Yeah the mind boogles at how you don't know what a literature review is!!

opps boggles - that is very impressive you got onto a PhD without knowing what a literature review is! What's your secret?

Probably you should have asked this question keeping in mind, the expecation of your supervisor. It would be more precise that you get a definite answer if you can discuss with your supervisor. Basically you may be prompted to ask this question with regard to time consumption because different disciplines of sciences, areas of research or even branches of studies will require different ways of searching for literature works. Simultaneously you can yourself frame a definition about literature collection and see if it matches perfectly with that of your boss as well as other colleagues there is nothing to worry.

I'm amazed there is somebody worse than you as she got onto a PhD and didn't realise that it involved writing a thesis!!!!! That really amazes me and I can't even comprehend the idea!! Students eh?

a literature review is a review of literature. got it? not literature as in anna karenina or Jane Eyre, but stuff published on your PhD topic. Is everything clear now? Good.

Perhaps, you shouldn't get so mad at Andy. In different disciplines there are different main criteria that PhD committee is looking for when choosing future PhD students. Come on, it was just a question for advice! It could be that the person never took a research methods course ...