The main purpose of a dissertation literature review is to give your research paper some credibility by listing the authors and a brief summary of their works and how they pertained to your study. The literature review is the chapter in your dissertation that summarizes the references in your investigation. It is in this chapter that you discuss the work of another person whose information helped you throughout your study. This also helps to show your readers that your topic is an important one, as others felt the need to write about it.

In a dissertation literature review, you should only used references that are reliable. Many of these may be dissertations or theses that you obtained from a library or from a professor. They can be books or websites written specifically by a professional in the field in which your topic lies. Within these materials, you might be able to find literature reviews that you can use as samples or templates to your own.

Some of the details that you should include in your dissertation literature review are the thesis statements of the authors and their final findings. If they used a methodology similar to yours, or if you were inspired by their way of doing things and tried it for yourself, then these ways should also be briefly mentioned. Summarizing the authors’ conclusion is vital, as it proves to you and your readers how the author came upon their conclusion and proved their results.

The dissertation literature review provides the reader with the resources used within your paper, which allows them to not only realize how important your topic is, but allows them to also feel confident that the research in your paper is plausible and creditable. They can view why you chose your methods and how you came to some of your conclusions based on the methods and views of other authors in the topic.