Do children, ages 0-18 who receive all of their childhood immunizations, compared to those who do not, have a rate of autism spectrum
diagnoses?
A literature review refers to a collection of materials on a specific topic. The review evaluates and reports on the main ideas of a
particular subject area using synthesis. Synthesizing information is not summarizing each article, but rather organizing the information
by the main points of the larger topic.
Your assignment is to select 5 to 6 peer-reviewed journal articles published in the past 5-6 years based on your PICO question that you
developed in the Discussion Board. You will then synthesize the articles creating a 5 to 6 page (excluding the title and reference pages –
1,200 to 1,500 words) literature review on your topic/PICO. A synthesis matrix table may be included if you located 6 or more relevant
sources for your synthesis paper (see below).
Front Matter
Include a title page that has a descriptive title, your name, your email, your ground mail address, and your institutional affiliation
(APN department at ISU).
Do not number the title page
Report Body Format
Each page of the body of your literature review should have a header per APA format. The header should contain an abbreviated title for
the report and a page number flush right.
Indicate organizational structure within your literature review by using headings and subheadings. Make sure that headings at the same
level are written in parallel form. Also, make sure that headings at the same level are consistently placed on the page (i.e., centered,
flush left, indented, etc.). If you use underlining, italics, or boldface to indicate heading level, make sure you use it consistently.
The body of your literature review is double-spaced pages using a professional looking font, 11 to 12 point. You will need to cite all
your sources using APA citation style.
Literature Review Content
Generally, the purpose of a review is to analyze critically a segment of a published body of knowledge through summary, classification,
and comparison of prior research studies, reviews of literature, and theoretical articles.
The content must contain your PICO question or thesis statement in the first paragraph. The remaining paragraphs need to synthesize your
sources by topic relating to the PICO research question. The final paragraph should contain a conclusion to your literature review
summarizing your thesis and outcomes of the research review.
Here is an outline for you to follow for your paper:
1. In the introduction, you should:
• Define or identify the general topic, issue, or area of concern, thus providing an appropriate context for reviewing the literature
(think PICO!).
• Point out overall trends in what has been published about the topic; or conflicts in theory, methodology, evidence, and conclusions; or
gaps in research and scholarship; or a single problem or new perspective of immediate interest.
• Establish the writer’s reason (point of view) for reviewing the literature; explain the criteria to be used in analyzing and comparing
literature and the organization of the review (sequence); and, when necessary, state why certain literature is or is not included (scope).
2. In the body, you should:
• Group research studies and other types of literature (reviews, theoretical articles, case studies, etc.) according to common
denominators such as qualitative versus quantitative approaches, conclusions of authors, specific purpose or objective, chronology, etc.
• Summarize individual studies or articles with as much or as little detail as each merits according to its comparative importance in the
literature, remembering that space (length) denotes significance.
• Provide the reader with strong “umbrella” sentences at beginnings of paragraphs, “signposts” throughout, and brief “so what” summary
sentences at intermediate points in the review to aid in understanding comparisons and analyses.
3. In the conclusion, you should:
• Summarize major contributions of significant studies and articles to the body of knowledge under review, maintaining the focus
established in the introduction.
• Evaluate the current “state of the art” for the body of knowledge reviewed, pointing out major methodological flaws or gaps in research,
inconsistencies in theory and findings, and areas or issues pertinent to future study.
• Conclude by providing some insight into the relationship between the central topic of the literature review and a larger area of study
such as a discipline, a scientific endeavor, or a profession.
4. APA Style throughout paper:
• Title Page
• Body
• Reference
Note: For the body of your paper, do not simply copy in all of the content from each of your sources to create your literature review. The
information you have gleaned from your database searches needs to be synthesized by key topic for your particular PICO question. The
following tutorials are good sources for understanding how to synthesize information:
1) Literature Review: Synthesizing Multiple Sources
*Found under “Course Documents” in