WHAT IS A REVIEW PAPER?

A review article or review paper is based on other published articles. It does not report original research. Review articles
generally summarize the existing literature on a topic in an attempt to explain the current state of understanding on the
topic. Review articles can be of three kinds:

A narrative review explains the existing knowledge on a topic based on all the published research available on the topic.

A systematic review searches for the answer to a particular question in the existing scientific literature on a topic.

A meta-analysis compares and combines the findings of previously published studies, usually to assess the effectiveness of
an intervention or mode of treatment.

Review papers form valuable scientific literature as they summarize the findings of existing literature. So readers can form
an idea about the existing knowledge on a topic without having to read all the published works in the field. Well-written
review articles are popular, particularly in the field of medicine and healthcare. Most reputed journals publish review
articles. However, you should check the website of the journal you wish to get published in to see if they accept such
articles. If published in a good peer-reviewed journal, review articles often have a high impact and receive a lot of citations.

TIPS IN WRITING A REVIEW PAPER

Rule 1: Define a Topic and Audience
How to choose which topic to review? There are so many issues in contemporary science that you could spend a
lifetime of attending conferences and reading the literature just pondering what to review. On the one hand, if you
take several years to choose, several other people may have had the same idea in the meantime. On the other hand,
only a well-considered topic is likely to lead to a brilliant literature review. The topic must at least be:

Rule 2: Search and Re-search the Literature

After having chosen your topic and audience, start by checking the literature and downloading relevant papers. Five
pieces of advice here:
The chances are high that someone will already have published a literature review (Figure 1), if not exactly on the
issue you are planning to tackle, at least on a related topic. If there are already a few or several reviews of the
literature on your issue, my advice is not to give up, but to carry on with your own literature review,

Rule 3: Take Notes While Reading

If you read the papers first, and only afterwards start writing the review, you will need a very good memory to
remember who wrote what, and what your impressions and associations were while reading each single paper. My
advice is, while reading, to start writing down interesting pieces of information, insights about how to organize the
review, and thoughts on what to write. This way, by the time you have read the literature you selected, you will
already have a rough draft of the review.
Rule 4: Choose the Type of Review You Wish to Write
After having taken notes while reading the literature, you will have a rough idea of the amount of material available
for the review. This is probably a good time to decide whether to go for a mini- or a full review. Some journals are
now favouring the publication of rather short reviews focusing on the last few years, with a limit on the number of
words and citations. A mini-review is not necessarily a minor review: it may well attract more attention from busy
readers, although it will inevitably simplify some issues and leave out some relevant material due to space
limitations. A full review will have the advantage of more freedom to cover in detail the complexities of a particular
scientific development, but may then be left in the pile of the very important papers “to be read” by readers with little
time to spare for major monographs.

Rule 5: Keep the Review Focused, but Make It of Broad Interest

Whether your plan is to write a mini- or a full review, it is good advice to keep it focused Including material just for
the sake of it can easily lead to reviews that are trying to do too many things at once. The need to keep a review
focused can be problematic for interdisciplinary reviews, where the aim is to bridge the gap between fields. If you
are writing a review on, for example, how epidemiological approaches are used in modelling the spread of ideas, you
may be inclined to include material from both parent fields, epidemiology and the study of cultural diffusion. This
may be necessary to some extent, but in this case a focused review would only deal in detail with those studies at the
interface between epidemiology and the spread of ideas.

Rule 6: Be Critical and Consistent

Reviewing the literature is not stamp collecting. A good review does not just summarize the literature, but discusses
it critically, identifies methodological problems, and points out research gaps. After having read a review of the
literature, a reader should have a rough idea of:

Rule 7: Find a Logical Structure

Like a well-baked cake, a good review has a number of telling features: it is worth the reader's time, timely,
systematic, well written, focused, and critical. It also needs a good structure. With reviews, the usual subdivision of
research papers into introduction, methods, results, and discussion does not work or is rarely used. However, a
general introduction of the context and, toward the end, a recapitulation of the main points covered and take-home
messages make sense also in the case of reviews. For systematic reviews, there is a trend towards including
information about how the literature was searched (database, keywords, time limits).

Rule 8: Make Use of Feedback

Reviews of the literature are normally peer-reviewed in the same way as research papers, and rightly so. As a rule,
incorporating feedback from reviewers greatly helps improve a review draft. Having read the review with a fresh
mind, reviewers may spot inaccuracies, inconsistencies, and ambiguities that had not been noticed by the writers due
to rereading the typescript too many times. It is however advisable to reread the draft one more time before
submission, as a last-minute correction of typos, leaps, and muddled sentences may enable the reviewers to focus on
providing advice on the content rather than the form.

Rule 9: Include Your Own Relevant Research, but Be Objective

In many cases, reviewers of the literature will have published studies relevant to the review they are writing. This
could create a conflict of interest: how can reviewers report objectively on their own work? Some scientists may be
overly enthusiastic about what they have published, and thus risk giving too much importance to their own findings
in the review. However, bias could also occur in the other direction: some scientists may be unduly dismissive of
their own achievements, so that they will tend to downplay their contribution (if any) to a field when reviewing it.
Rule 10: Be Up-to-Date, but Do Not Forget Older Studies
Given the progressive acceleration in the publication of scientific papers, today's reviews of the literature need
awareness not just of the overall direction and achievements of a field of inquiry, but also of the latest studies, so as
not to become out-of-date before they have been published. Ideally, a literature review should not identify as a major
research gap an issue that has just been addressed in a series of papers in press (the same applies, of course, to older,
overlooked studies (“sleeping beauties”)). This implies that literature reviewers would do well to keep an eye on
electronic lists of papers in press, given that it can take months before these appear in scientific databases. Some
reviews declare that they have scanned the literature up to a certain point in time, but given that peer review can be a
rather lengthy process, a full search for newly appeared literature at the revision stage may be worthwhile. Assessing
the contribution of papers that have just appeared is particularly challenging, because there is little perspective with
which to gauge their significance and impact on further research and society.

CRITIQUE PAPER
A critique paper is a paper in which you analyze and evaluate an author's work. This requires you to
conduct a thorough and detailed study of the piece you are critiquing, analyzing the author's style,
evidence, opinions, credentials, conclusions and logic. Once you have formulated your argument, you
need to articulate it in your paper, and this begins with the right introduction. When you use your
introduction effectively, you draw the reader into the material, introduce the author's position and inform
the reader of your general conclusions.

TIPS IN WRITING A CRITIQUE PAPER

1. A critique is often assigned to analyze a work of literature, such as an essay, a book,
poetry, etc. However, paintings, movies, and so on can also be the subject of your
critical analysis.
2. When writing a critique, you can also introduce your opinion on a subject and make
your own judgment.
3. Always provide reasonable and convincing arguments. Your assertions and
judgments are worth nothing if they are not backed up with supporting arguments.
4. Be sure to use an impartial tone.

5. A critique can be somewhat confusing when you don’t know how to link it to your
thesis. If you see that your writing is taking you nowhere, consider consulting with
someone, or choose another object for your investigation.
6. Even if you disliked the work you have chosen to analyze, be polite. Your reader will
want to get a sophisticated point of view.
Dos and Don’ts of Critique Writing

Essentially, your paper has to do justice to the author’s or creator’s work. You will be
providing a detailed examination of the main theme and organization of a book,
article, movie, artwork or whatever you are assigned to critique. In your critique, you
will summarize, analyze, interpret and evaluate the work.

Do address these issues in your critique:

7. Has the author/creator chosen a good topic and done an adequate job collecting
evidence?
8. What techniques were used by the author/creator to convey the primary message of
the critique? Were these techniques successful?
9. Does the author’s/creator’s style adequately suit the topic being covered?

Don’t:

10. Pay an unwarranted amount of attention to the topic presented by the author/creator.
For example, the article’s topic might be positive thinking, but this is not the focus of
the paper. The topic should be stated briefly in the summary, but the primary focus
is how the topic is dealt with by the author.
11. Express your personal bias or opinion throughout the paper. You are permitted to
give your opinion, but only in the critical response section (it is preceded by summary
and analysis).
12. Manufacture false evidence so you can discuss the author’s work in a negative light.
Remember, critical essays can be either positive or negative, whichever is more
suitable.
13. Read the book that you’ve chosen (make sure it’s something you like), preferably
twice. If you don’t have time or desire to read the book twice, study it once, but
thoroughly and take detailed notes.
14. Mark the places you will talk about in your critical response essay. Bookmarks or
sticky flags can be very handy.

15. Here you will provide the reader with a brief synopsis of the main points of the work
you are critiquing, which will be followed by a careful analysis of the meaning of the
work.
16. State your general opinion of the work, as this will act as your thesis statement. The
ideal situation is that you identify and use a thesis that is controversial.
17. Remember that you will uncover a lot of basic information about the work you are
critiquing and it is important that you don’t make use of all of it, providing the reader
with information that is unnecessary in the context of your critique. If you are writing
about Shakespeare, you don’t have to waste your or your reader’s time going
through all of his works.

The body of the critique contains the supporting paragraphs. This is where you will
provide the facts that prove your main idea and support your thesis. Follow these tips
when writing the body of your critique:
18. Every paragraph must focus on a precise concept that is present in the work and
your job is to include arguments to support or disprove that concept. Concrete
evidence is required.
19. A critical essay is written in the third-person and ensures the reader is presented with
an objective analysis.
20. Discuss whether or not the author/creator was able to achieve their goals and
adequately get their point across.
21. It is important not to confuse facts and opinions. An opinion is a personal thought and
requires confirmation, whereas a fact is supported by solid data and requires no
further proof. Do not back up one opinion with another opinion.
22. Remember that your purpose is to provide the reader with an understanding of a
particular piece of literature or other work from your point of view. Be as specific, as
possible.
23. Summarize the analysis you provided in the body of the critique.
24. Summarize the primary reasons you provided the analysis.
25. Where appropriate, provide recommendations on how the work you critiqued can be
improved.

Key Difference – Critique vs Review

What is the difference between Critique and Review?

Definitions of Critique and Review:

Critique: A critique is a critical assessment.

Review: A review is a formal evaluation.
Characteristics of Critique and Review:

Nature:

Critique: A critique tends to be objective.

Review: A review is more often than not subjective.
Technical Basis:

Critique: A critique usually has a sound technical basis.

Review: A review lacks a technical basis.
Writer:

Critique: A critique is written by someone who has a lot of experience and expertise of a
particular genre.
Review: A review can be written by anyone. Expertise in a field is not required to write a
review.
 How to Write a Critique
A critique is a short paper, usually about one book or article. First, it gives a short summary of what the author has said.
Second, it looks at the work critically. You will need to assess the strengths and weaknesses of the piece of research or
writing. It is important to remember that criticism can be positive as well as negative.

Why write a critique?

A critique is an exercise in judging the value of a piece of writing or research. It is also a way of improving your own skills by
looking at the way other writers and researchers work. It is a valuable exercise in the careful reading of text that will
increase your understanding of a particular subject

TIPS IN WRITING A CRITIQUE PAPER

5. A critique is often assigned to analyze a work of literature, such as an essay, a book,
poetry, etc. However, paintings, movies, and so on can also be the subject of your
critical analysis.
6. When writing a critique, you can also introduce your opinion on a subject and make
your own judgment.
7. Always provide reasonable and convincing arguments. Your assertions and
judgments are worth nothing if they are not backed up with supporting arguments.
8. Be sure to use an impartial tone.

7. A critique can be somewhat confusing when you don’t know how to link it to your
thesis. If you see that your writing is taking you nowhere, consider consulting with
someone, or choose another object for your investigation.
8. Even if you disliked the work you have chosen to analyze, be polite. Your reader will
want to get a sophisticated point of view.

10. Has the author/creator chosen a good topic and done an adequate job collecting
evidence?
11. What techniques were used by the author/creator to convey the primary message of
the critique? Were these techniques successful?
12. Does the author’s/creator’s style adequately suit the topic being covered?

15. Pay an unwarranted amount of attention to the topic presented by the author/creator.
For example, the article’s topic might be positive thinking, but this is not the focus of
the paper. The topic should be stated briefly in the summary, but the primary focus
is how the topic is dealt with by the author.
16. Express your personal bias or opinion throughout the paper. You are permitted to
give your opinion, but only in the critical response section (it is preceded by summary
and analysis).
17. Manufacture false evidence so you can discuss the author’s work in a negative light.
Remember, critical essays can be either positive or negative, whichever is more
suitable.
18. Read the book that you’ve chosen (make sure it’s something you like), preferably
twice. If you don’t have time or desire to read the book twice, study it once, but
thoroughly and take detailed notes.
19. Mark the places you will talk about in your critical response essay. Bookmarks or
sticky flags can be very handy.

18. Here you will provide the reader with a brief synopsis of the main points of the work
you are critiquing, which will be followed by a careful analysis of the meaning of the
work.
19. State your general opinion of the work, as this will act as your thesis statement. The
ideal situation is that you identify and use a thesis that is controversial.
20. Remember that you will uncover a lot of basic information about the work you are
critiquing and it is important that you don’t make use of all of it, providing the reader
with information that is unnecessary in the context of your critique. If you are writing
about Shakespeare, you don’t have to waste your or your reader’s time going
through all of his works.

The body of the critique contains the supporting paragraphs. This is where you will
provide the facts that prove your main idea and support your thesis. Follow these tips
when writing the body of your critique:

26. Every paragraph must focus on a precise concept that is present in the work and
your job is to include arguments to support or disprove that concept. Concrete
evidence is required.
27. A critical essay is written in the third-person and ensures the reader is presented with
an objective analysis.
28. Discuss whether or not the author/creator was able to achieve their goals and
adequately get their point across.
29. It is important not to confuse facts and opinions. An opinion is a personal thought and
requires confirmation, whereas a fact is supported by solid data and requires no
further proof. Do not back up one opinion with another opinion.
30. Remember that your purpose is to provide the reader with an understanding of a
particular piece of literature or other work from your point of view. Be as specific, as
possible.
31. Summarize the analysis you provided in the body of the critique.
32. Summarize the primary reasons you provided the analysis.
33. Where appropriate, provide recommendations on how the work you critiqued can be
improved.
 REVIEW PAPER
The purpose of a review paper is to succinctly review recent progress in a particular topic. Overall, the paper
summarizes the current state of knowledge of the topic. It creates an understanding of the topic for the reader by
discussing the findings presented in recent research papers.

A review paper is not a "term paper" or book report. It is not merely a report on some references you found.
Instead, a review paper synthesizes the results from several primary literature papers to produce a coherent
argument about a topic or focused description of a field.

Examples of scientific reviews can be found in:

 Scientific American

 Science in the "Perspectives" and "Reviews" sections

 Nature in the "News and Views" section

 Compilations of reviews such as:

Current Opinion in Cell Biology

Current Opinion in Genetics & Development

Annual Review of Plant Physiology and Plant Molecular Biology

Annual Review of Physiology

Trends in Ecology & Evolution

 Almost every scientific journal has special review articles.

You should read articles from one or more of these sources to get examples of how your paper should be
organized.

Scientists commonly use reviews to communicate with each other and the general public. There are a wide
variety of review styles from ones aimed at a general audience (e.g., Scientific American) to those directed at
biologists within a particular subdiscipline (e.g., Annual Review of Physiology).

A key aspect of a review paper is that it provides the evidence for a particular point of view in a field. Thus, a
large focus of your paper should be a description of the data that support or refute that point of view. In addition,
you should inform the reader of the experimental techniques that were used to generate the data.

The emphasis of a review paper is interpreting the primary literature on the subject. You need to read
several original research articles on the same topic and make your own conclusions about the meanings of those
papers.
 TIPS IN WRITING A REVIEW PAPER

Rule 1: Define a Topic and Audience

How to choose which topic to review? There are so many issues in contemporary science that you could
spend a lifetime of attending conferences and reading the literature just pondering what to review. On the
one hand, if you take several years to choose, several other people may have had the same idea in the
meantime. On the other hand, only a well-considered topic is likely to lead to a brilliant literature review.
The topic must at least be:
Rule 2: Search and Re-search the Literature

After having chosen your topic and audience, start by checking the literature and downloading relevant
papers. Five pieces of advice here:
The chances are high that someone will already have published a literature review (Figure 1), if not exactly
on the issue you are planning to tackle, at least on a related topic. If there are already a few or several
reviews of the literature on your issue, my advice is not to give up, but to carry on with your own literature
review,
Rule 3: Take Notes While Reading

If you read the papers first, and only afterwards start writing the review, you will need a very good memory
to remember who wrote what, and what your impressions and associations were while reading each single
paper. My advice is, while reading, to start writing down interesting pieces of information, insights about
how to organize the review, and thoughts on what to write. This way, by the time you have read the
literature you selected, you will already have a rough draft of the review.
Rule 4: Choose the Type of Review You Wish to Write

After having taken notes while reading the literature, you will have a rough idea of the amount of material
available for the review. This is probably a good time to decide whether to go for a mini- or a full review.
Some journals are now favouring the publication of rather short reviews focusing on the last few years,
with a limit on the number of words and citations. A mini-review is not necessarily a minor review: it may
well attract more attention from busy readers, although it will inevitably simplify some issues and leave out
some relevant material due to space limitations. A full review will have the advantage of more freedom to
cover in detail the complexities of a particular scientific development, but may then be left in the pile of the
very important papers “to be read” by readers with little time to spare for major monographs.
Rule 5: Keep the Review Focused, but Make It of Broad Interest

Whether your plan is to write a mini- or a full review, it is good advice to keep it focused Including
material just for the sake of it can easily lead to reviews that are trying to do too many things at once. The
need to keep a review focused can be problematic for interdisciplinary reviews, where the aim is to bridge
the gap between fields. If you are writing a review on, for example, how epidemiological approaches are
used in modelling the spread of ideas, you may be inclined to include material from both parent fields,
epidemiology and the study of cultural diffusion. This may be necessary to some extent, but in this case a
focused review would only deal in detail with those studies at the interface between epidemiology and the
spread of ideas.
Rule 6: Be Critical and Consistent
Reviewing the literature is not stamp collecting. A good review does not just summarize the literature, but
discusses it critically, identifies methodological problems, and points out research gaps. After having read a
review of the literature, a reader should have a rough idea of:
Rule 7: Find a Logical Structure

Like a well-baked cake, a good review has a number of telling features: it is worth the reader's time, timely,
systematic, well written, focused, and critical. It also needs a good structure. With reviews, the usual
subdivision of research papers into introduction, methods, results, and discussion does not work or is rarely
used. However, a general introduction of the context and, toward the end, a recapitulation of the main
points covered and take-home messages make sense also in the case of reviews. For systematic reviews,
there is a trend towards including information about how the literature was searched (database, keywords,
time limits).
Rule 8: Make Use of Feedback

Reviews of the literature are normally peer-reviewed in the same way as research papers, and rightly so. As
a rule, incorporating feedback from reviewers greatly helps improve a review draft. Having read the review
with a fresh mind, reviewers may spot inaccuracies, inconsistencies, and ambiguities that had not been
noticed by the writers due to rereading the typescript too many times. It is however advisable to reread the
draft one more time before submission, as a last-minute correction of typos, leaps, and muddled sentences
may enable the reviewers to focus on providing advice on the content rather than the form.
Rule 9: Include Your Own Relevant Research, but Be Objective

In many cases, reviewers of the literature will have published studies relevant to the review they are
writing. This could create a conflict of interest: how can reviewers report objectively on their own work?
Some scientists may be overly enthusiastic about what they have published, and thus risk giving too much
importance to their own findings in the review. However, bias could also occur in the other direction: some
scientists may be unduly dismissive of their own achievements, so that they will tend to downplay their
contribution (if any) to a field when reviewing it.
Rule 10: Be Up-to-Date, but Do Not Forget Older Studies

Given the progressive acceleration in the publication of scientific papers, today's reviews of the literature
need awareness not just of the overall direction and achievements of a field of inquiry, but also of the latest
studies, so as not to become out-of-date before they have been published. Ideally, a literature review should
not identify as a major research gap an issue that has just been addressed in a series of papers in press (the
same applies, of course, to older, overlooked studies (“sleeping beauties”)). This implies that literature
reviewers would do well to keep an eye on electronic lists of papers in press, given that it can take months
before these appear in scientific databases. Some reviews declare that they have scanned the literature up to
a certain point in time, but given that peer review can be a rather lengthy process, a full search for newly
appeared literature at the revision stage may be worthwhile. Assessing the contribution of papers that have
just appeared is particularly challenging, because there is little perspective with which to gauge their
significance and impact on further research and society.
 Key Difference – Critique vs Review
To most people a critique and review hold no difference as they are both types of evaluations or
assessments of a piece of work. This, however, is a misleading idea because a critique and review
are two different things that share certain components. A critique refers to a critical assessment.
On the other hand, a review also refers to a form of assessment. The key difference between the
two is that a review can be compiled by anyone and consists of a subjective opinion of
a work, unlike a critique which is written by an expert in the field with a technical
comprehension.

What is a Critique?

A critique can simply be understood as a critical assessment. Unlike most reviews, critiques are
written by experts in a particular field. Hence, critiques tend to be technical and objective. They
do not provide an overall assessment but focuses on specific parts of a piece of work. It
emphasizes both the positives as well as the negatives.

What is a Review?

A review refers to a formal evaluation of a particular work. In magazines and newspapers, you
may have seen various reviews such as book reviews, film reviews, restaurant reviews, music, etc.
These are written by lay persons in the form of an assessment of something. For an example, let
us take a book review. In a book review, the individual first reads the book, understands and
assesses it, then he compiles a review. In this review, the writer presents a holistic view of the
book. He does not analyze each and every segment separately but presents an overall assessment.
This can be either positive or negative.

Nowadays, we can find reviews even for various home appliances, technical gadgets, phones, etc.
These are known as user reviews. Other than this, there is another category known as peer
reviews in academia. This is another type of reviews used by scholars to assess the works of their
colleagues.