Advantages and disadvantages of literature review
This comprehensive article explores some of the advantages and disadvantages of literature review in research. Reviewing relevant literature is a key area in research, and indeed, it is a research activity in itself. It helps researchers investigate a particular topic in detail. However, it has some limitations as well.
What is literature review?
In order to understand the advantages and disadvantages of literature review, it is important to understand what a literature review is and how it differs from other methods of research. According to Jones and Gratton (2009) a literature review essentially consists of critically reading, evaluating, and organising existing literature on a topic to assess the state of knowledge in the area. It is sometimes called critical review.
A literature review is a select analysis of existing research which is relevant to a researcher’s selected topic, showing how it relates to their investigation. It explains and justifies how their investigation may help answer some of the questions or gaps in the chosen area of study (University of Reading, 2022).
A literature review is a term used in the field of research to describe a systematic and methodical investigation of the relevant literature on a particular topic. In other words, it is an analysis of existing research on a topic in order to identify any relevant studies and draw conclusions about the topic.
A literature review is not the same as a bibliography or a database search. Rather than simply listing references to sources of information, a literature review involves critically evaluating and summarizing existing research on a topic. As such, it is a much more detailed and complex process than simply searching databases and websites, and it requires a lot of effort and skills.
Advantages of literature review
Information synthesis
A literature review is a very thorough and methodical exercise. It can be used to synthesize information and draw conclusions about a particular topic. Through a careful evaluation and critical summarization, researchers can draw a clear and comprehensive picture of the chosen topic.
Familiarity with the current knowledge
According to the University of Illinois (2022), literature reviews allow researchers to gain familiarity with the existing knowledge in their selected field, as well as the boundaries and limitations of that field.
Creation of new body of knowledge
One of the key advantages of literature review is that it creates new body of knowledge. Through careful evaluation and critical summarisation, researchers can create a new body of knowledge and enrich the field of study.
Answers to a range of questions
Literature reviews help researchers analyse the existing body of knowledge to determine the answers to a range of questions concerning a particular subject.
Disadvantages of literature review
Time consuming
As a literature review involves collecting and evaluating research and summarizing the findings, it requires a significant amount of time. To conduct a comprehensive review, researchers need to read many different articles and analyse a lot of data. This means that their review will take a long time to complete.
Lack of quality sources
Researchers are expected to use a wide variety of sources of information to present a comprehensive review. However, it may sometimes be challenging for them to identify the quality sources because of the availability of huge numbers in their chosen field. It may also happen because of the lack of past empirical work, particularly if the selected topic is an unpopular one.
Descriptive writing
One of the major disadvantages of literature review is that instead of critical appreciation, some researchers end up developing reviews that are mostly descriptive. Their reviews are often more like summaries of the work of other writers and lack in criticality. It is worth noting that they must go beyond describing the literature.
Key features of literature review
Clear organisation
A literature review is typically a very critical and thorough process. Universities usually recommend students a particular structure to develop their reviews. Like all other academic writings, a review starts with an introduction and ends with a conclusion. Between the beginning and the end, researchers present the main body of the review containing the critical discussion of sources.
No obvious bias
A key feature of a literature review is that it should be very unbiased and objective. However, it should be mentioned that researchers may sometimes be influenced by their own opinions of the world.
Proper citation
One of the key features of literature review is that it must be properly cited. Researchers should include all the sources that they have used for information. They must do citations and provide a reference list by the end in line with a recognized referencing system such as Harvard.
To conclude this article, it can be said that a literature review is a type of research that seeks to examine and summarise existing research on a particular topic. It is an essential part of a dissertation/thesis. However, it is not an easy thing to handle by an inexperienced person. It also requires a lot of time and patience.
Hope you like this ‘Advantages and disadvantages of literature review’. Please share this with others to support our research work.
Other useful articles:
How to evaluate website content
Advantages and disadvantages of primary and secondary research
Advantages and disadvantages of simple random sampling
Last update: 08 May 2022
References:
Jones, I., & Gratton, C. (2009) Research Methods for Sports Shttps://www.howandwhat.net/new/evaluate-website-content/tudies, 2 nd edition, London: Routledge
University of Illinois (2022) Literature review, available at: https://www.uis.edu/learning-hub/writing-resources/handouts/learning-hub/literature-review (accessed 08 May 2022)
University of Reading (2022) Literature reviews, available at: https://libguides.reading.ac.uk/literaturereview/starting (accessed 07 May 2022)
Author: M Rahman
M Rahman writes extensively online and offline with an emphasis on business management, marketing, and tourism. He is a lecturer in Management and Marketing. He holds an MSc in Tourism & Hospitality from the University of Sunderland. Also, graduated from Leeds Metropolitan University with a BA in Business & Management Studies and completed a DTLLS (Diploma in Teaching in the Life-Long Learning Sector) from London South Bank University.
Related Posts
How to be a good team player, competitive advantage for tourist destinations, advantages and disadvantages of snowball sampling.
- Become Involved |
- Give to the Library |
- Staff Directory |
- UNF Library
- Thomas G. Carpenter Library
Conducting a Literature Review
Benefits of conducting a literature review.
- Steps in Conducting a Literature Review
- Summary of the Process
- Additional Resources
- Literature Review Tutorial by American University Library
- The Literature Review: A Few Tips On Conducting It by University of Toronto
- Write a Literature Review by UC Santa Cruz University Library
While there might be many reasons for conducting a literature review, following are four key outcomes of doing the review.
Assessment of the current state of research on a topic . This is probably the most obvious value of the literature review. Once a researcher has determined an area to work with for a research project, a search of relevant information sources will help determine what is already known about the topic and how extensively the topic has already been researched.
Identification of the experts on a particular topic . One of the additional benefits derived from doing the literature review is that it will quickly reveal which researchers have written the most on a particular topic and are, therefore, probably the experts on the topic. Someone who has written twenty articles on a topic or on related topics is more than likely more knowledgeable than someone who has written a single article. This same writer will likely turn up as a reference in most of the other articles written on the same topic. From the number of articles written by the author and the number of times the writer has been cited by other authors, a researcher will be able to assume that the particular author is an expert in the area and, thus, a key resource for consultation in the current research to be undertaken.
Identification of key questions about a topic that need further research . In many cases a researcher may discover new angles that need further exploration by reviewing what has already been written on a topic. For example, research may suggest that listening to music while studying might lead to better retention of ideas, but the research might not have assessed whether a particular style of music is more beneficial than another. A researcher who is interested in pursuing this topic would then do well to follow up existing studies with a new study, based on previous research, that tries to identify which styles of music are most beneficial to retention.
Determination of methodologies used in past studies of the same or similar topics. It is often useful to review the types of studies that previous researchers have launched as a means of determining what approaches might be of most benefit in further developing a topic. By the same token, a review of previously conducted studies might lend itself to researchers determining a new angle for approaching research.
Upon completion of the literature review, a researcher should have a solid foundation of knowledge in the area and a good feel for the direction any new research should take. Should any additional questions arise during the course of the research, the researcher will know which experts to consult in order to quickly clear up those questions.
- << Previous: Home
- Next: Steps in Conducting a Literature Review >>
- Last Updated: Aug 29, 2022 8:54 AM
- URL: https://libguides.unf.edu/litreview
- UConn Library
- Literature Review: The What, Why and How-to Guide
- Introduction
Literature Review: The What, Why and How-to Guide — Introduction
- Getting Started
- How to Pick a Topic
- Strategies to Find Sources
- Evaluating Sources & Lit. Reviews
- Tips for Writing Literature Reviews
- Writing Literature Review: Useful Sites
- Citation Resources
- Other Academic Writings
What are Literature Reviews?
So, what is a literature review? "A literature review is an account of what has been published on a topic by accredited scholars and researchers. In writing the literature review, your purpose is to convey to your reader what knowledge and ideas have been established on a topic, and what their strengths and weaknesses are. As a piece of writing, the literature review must be defined by a guiding concept (e.g., your research objective, the problem or issue you are discussing, or your argumentative thesis). It is not just a descriptive list of the material available, or a set of summaries." Taylor, D. The literature review: A few tips on conducting it . University of Toronto Health Sciences Writing Centre.
Goals of Literature Reviews
What are the goals of creating a Literature Review? A literature could be written to accomplish different aims:
- To develop a theory or evaluate an existing theory
- To summarize the historical or existing state of a research topic
- Identify a problem in a field of research
Baumeister, R. F., & Leary, M. R. (1997). Writing narrative literature reviews . Review of General Psychology , 1 (3), 311-320.
What kinds of sources require a Literature Review?
- A research paper assigned in a course
- A thesis or dissertation
- A grant proposal
- An article intended for publication in a journal
All these instances require you to collect what has been written about your research topic so that you can demonstrate how your own research sheds new light on the topic.
Types of Literature Reviews
What kinds of literature reviews are written?
Narrative review: The purpose of this type of review is to describe the current state of the research on a specific topic/research and to offer a critical analysis of the literature reviewed. Studies are grouped by research/theoretical categories, and themes and trends, strengths and weakness, and gaps are identified. The review ends with a conclusion section which summarizes the findings regarding the state of the research of the specific study, the gaps identify and if applicable, explains how the author's research will address gaps identify in the review and expand the knowledge on the topic reviewed.
- Example : Predictors and Outcomes of U.S. Quality Maternity Leave: A Review and Conceptual Framework: 10.1177/08948453211037398
Systematic review : "The authors of a systematic review use a specific procedure to search the research literature, select the studies to include in their review, and critically evaluate the studies they find." (p. 139). Nelson, L. K. (2013). Research in Communication Sciences and Disorders . Plural Publishing.
- Example : The effect of leave policies on increasing fertility: a systematic review: 10.1057/s41599-022-01270-w
Meta-analysis : "Meta-analysis is a method of reviewing research findings in a quantitative fashion by transforming the data from individual studies into what is called an effect size and then pooling and analyzing this information. The basic goal in meta-analysis is to explain why different outcomes have occurred in different studies." (p. 197). Roberts, M. C., & Ilardi, S. S. (2003). Handbook of Research Methods in Clinical Psychology . Blackwell Publishing.
- Example : Employment Instability and Fertility in Europe: A Meta-Analysis: 10.1215/00703370-9164737
Meta-synthesis : "Qualitative meta-synthesis is a type of qualitative study that uses as data the findings from other qualitative studies linked by the same or related topic." (p.312). Zimmer, L. (2006). Qualitative meta-synthesis: A question of dialoguing with texts . Journal of Advanced Nursing , 53 (3), 311-318.
- Example : Women’s perspectives on career successes and barriers: A qualitative meta-synthesis: 10.1177/05390184221113735
Literature Reviews in the Health Sciences
- UConn Health subject guide on systematic reviews Explanation of the different review types used in health sciences literature as well as tools to help you find the right review type
- << Previous: Getting Started
- Next: How to Pick a Topic >>
- Last Updated: Sep 21, 2022 2:16 PM
- URL: https://guides.lib.uconn.edu/literaturereview
News alert: UC Berkeley has announced its next university librarian
Secondary menu
- Log in to your Library account
- Hours and Maps
- Connect from Off Campus
- UC Berkeley Home
Search form
Conducting a literature review: why do a literature review, why do a literature review.
- How To Find "The Literature"
- Found it -- Now What?
Besides the obvious reason for students -- because it is assigned! -- a literature review helps you explore the research that has come before you, to see how your research question has (or has not) already been addressed.
You identify:
- core research in the field
- experts in the subject area
- methodology you may want to use (or avoid)
- gaps in knowledge -- or where your research would fit in
It Also Helps You:
- Publish and share your findings
- Justify requests for grants and other funding
- Identify best practices to inform practice
- Set wider context for a program evaluation
- Compile information to support community organizing
Great brief overview, from NCSU
Want To Know More?
- Next: How To Find "The Literature" >>
- Last Updated: Dec 8, 2023 10:11 AM
- URL: https://guides.lib.berkeley.edu/litreview
- Library Homepage
Literature Review: The What, Why and How-to Guide: Literature Reviews?
- Literature Reviews?
- Strategies to Finding Sources
- Keeping up with Research!
- Evaluating Sources & Literature Reviews
- Organizing for Writing
- Writing Literature Review
- Other Academic Writings
What is a Literature Review?
So, what is a literature review .
"A literature review is an account of what has been published on a topic by accredited scholars and researchers. In writing the literature review, your purpose is to convey to your reader what knowledge and ideas have been established on a topic, and what their strengths and weaknesses are. As a piece of writing, the literature review must be defined by a guiding concept (e.g., your research objective, the problem or issue you are discussing, or your argumentative thesis). It is not just a descriptive list of the material available or a set of summaries." - Quote from Taylor, D. (n.d)."The Literature Review: A Few Tips on Conducting it".
- Citation: "The Literature Review: A Few Tips on Conducting it"
What kinds of literature reviews are written?
Each field has a particular way to do reviews for academic research literature. In the social sciences and humanities the most common are:
- Narrative Reviews: The purpose of this type of review is to describe the current state of the research on a specific research topic and to offer a critical analysis of the literature reviewed. Studies are grouped by research/theoretical categories, and themes and trends, strengths and weaknesses, and gaps are identified. The review ends with a conclusion section that summarizes the findings regarding the state of the research of the specific study, the gaps identify and if applicable, explains how the author's research will address gaps identify in the review and expand the knowledge on the topic reviewed.
- Book review essays/ Historiographical review essays : A type of literature review typical in History and related fields, e.g., Latin American studies. For example, the Latin American Research Review explains that the purpose of this type of review is to “(1) to familiarize readers with the subject, approach, arguments, and conclusions found in a group of books whose common focus is a historical period; a country or region within Latin America; or a practice, development, or issue of interest to specialists and others; (2) to locate these books within current scholarship, critical methodologies, and approaches; and (3) to probe the relation of these new books to previous work on the subject, especially canonical texts. Unlike individual book reviews, the cluster reviews found in LARR seek to address the state of the field or discipline and not solely the works at issue.” - LARR
What are the Goals of Creating a Literature Review?
- To develop a theory or evaluate an existing theory
- To summarize the historical or existing state of a research topic
- Identify a problem in a field of research
- Baumeister, R.F. & Leary, M.R. (1997). "Writing narrative literature reviews," Review of General Psychology , 1(3), 311-320.
When do you need to write a Literature Review?
- When writing a prospectus or a thesis/dissertation
- When writing a research paper
- When writing a grant proposal
In all these cases you need to dedicate a chapter in these works to showcase what has been written about your research topic and to point out how your own research will shed new light into a body of scholarship.
Where I can find examples of Literature Reviews?
Note: In the humanities, even if they don't use the term "literature review", they may have a dedicated chapter that reviewed the "critical bibliography" or they incorporated that review in the introduction or first chapter of the dissertation, book, or article.
- UCSB electronic theses and dissertations In partnership with the Graduate Division, the UC Santa Barbara Library is making available theses and dissertations produced by UCSB students. Currently included in ADRL are theses and dissertations that were originally filed electronically, starting in 2011. In future phases of ADRL, all theses and dissertations created by UCSB students may be digitized and made available.
Where to Find Standalone Literature Reviews
Literature reviews are also written as standalone articles as a way to survey a particular research topic in-depth. This type of literature review looks at a topic from a historical perspective to see how the understanding of the topic has changed over time.
- Find e-Journals for Standalone Literature Reviews The best way to get familiar with and to learn how to write literature reviews is by reading them. You can use our Journal Search option to find journals that specialize in publishing literature reviews from major disciplines like anthropology, sociology, etc. Usually these titles are called, "Annual Review of [discipline name] OR [Discipline name] Review. This option works best if you know the title of the publication you are looking for. Below are some examples of these journals! more... less... Journal Search can be found by hovering over the link for Research on the library website.
Social Sciences
- Annual Review of Anthropology
- Annual Review of Political Science
- Annual Review of Sociology
- Ethnic Studies Review
Hard science and health sciences:
- Annual Review of Biomedical Data Science
- Annual Review of Materials Science
- Systematic Review From journal site: "The journal Systematic Reviews encompasses all aspects of the design, conduct, and reporting of systematic reviews" in the health sciences.
- << Previous: Overview
- Next: Strategies to Finding Sources >>
- Last Updated: Mar 5, 2024 11:44 AM
- URL: https://guides.library.ucsb.edu/litreview
Literature Reviews
- Getting started
What is a literature review?
Why conduct a literature review, stages of a literature review, lit reviews: an overview (video), check out these books.
- Types of reviews
- 1. Define your research question
- 2. Plan your search
- 3. Search the literature
- 4. Organize your results
- 5. Synthesize your findings
- 6. Write the review
- Artificial intelligence (AI) tools
- Thompson Writing Studio This link opens in a new window
- Need to write a systematic review? This link opens in a new window
Contact a Librarian
Ask a Librarian
Definition: A literature review is a systematic examination and synthesis of existing scholarly research on a specific topic or subject.
Purpose: It serves to provide a comprehensive overview of the current state of knowledge within a particular field.
Analysis: Involves critically evaluating and summarizing key findings, methodologies, and debates found in academic literature.
Identifying Gaps: Aims to pinpoint areas where there is a lack of research or unresolved questions, highlighting opportunities for further investigation.
Contextualization: Enables researchers to understand how their work fits into the broader academic conversation and contributes to the existing body of knowledge.
tl;dr A literature review critically examines and synthesizes existing scholarly research and publications on a specific topic to provide a comprehensive understanding of the current state of knowledge in the field.
What is a literature review NOT?
❌ An annotated bibliography
❌ Original research
❌ A summary
❌ Something to be conducted at the end of your research
❌ An opinion piece
❌ A chronological compilation of studies
The reason for conducting a literature review is to:
Literature Reviews: An Overview for Graduate Students
While this 9-minute video from NCSU is geared toward graduate students, it is useful for anyone conducting a literature review.
Writing the literature review: A practical guide
Available 3rd floor of Perkins
Writing literature reviews: A guide for students of the social and behavioral sciences
Available online!
So, you have to write a literature review: A guided workbook for engineers
Telling a research story: Writing a literature review
The literature review: Six steps to success
Systematic approaches to a successful literature review
Request from Duke Medical Center Library
Doing a systematic review: A student's guide
- Next: Types of reviews >>
- Last Updated: Apr 3, 2024 12:40 PM
- URL: https://guides.library.duke.edu/lit-reviews
Services for...
- Faculty & Instructors
- Graduate Students
- Undergraduate Students
- International Students
- Patrons with Disabilities
- Harmful Language Statement
- Re-use & Attribution / Privacy
- Support the Libraries
Libraries | Research Guides
Literature reviews, what is a literature review, learning more about how to do a literature review.
- Planning the Review
- The Research Question
- Choosing Where to Search
- Organizing the Review
- Writing the Review
A literature review is a review and synthesis of existing research on a topic or research question. A literature review is meant to analyze the scholarly literature, make connections across writings and identify strengths, weaknesses, trends, and missing conversations. A literature review should address different aspects of a topic as it relates to your research question. A literature review goes beyond a description or summary of the literature you have read.
- Sage Research Methods Core Collection This link opens in a new window SAGE Research Methods supports research at all levels by providing material to guide users through every step of the research process. SAGE Research Methods is the ultimate methods library with more than 1000 books, reference works, journal articles, and instructional videos by world-leading academics from across the social sciences, including the largest collection of qualitative methods books available online from any scholarly publisher. – Publisher
- Next: Planning the Review >>
- Last Updated: Jan 17, 2024 10:05 AM
- URL: https://libguides.northwestern.edu/literaturereviews
Literature Review: What is a Literature Review?
- Sample Searches
- Examples of Published Literature Reviews
- Researching Your Topic
- Subject Searching
- Google Scholar
- Track Your Work
- Citation Managers This link opens in a new window
- Citation Guides This link opens in a new window
- Tips on Writing Your Literature Review This link opens in a new window
- Research Help
Guide Author
Virtual Outreach Librarian
Ask a Librarian
Chat with a Librarian
Lisle: (630) 829-6057 Mesa: (480) 878-7514 Toll Free: (877) 575-6050 Email: [email protected]
Book a Research Consultation Library Hours
Not Just for Graduate Students!
A literature review is an in-depth critical analysis of published scholarly research related to a specific topic. Published scholarly research (the "literature") may include journal articles, books, book chapters, dissertations and thesis, or conference proceedings.
A solid lit review must:
- be organized around and related directly to the thesis or research question you're developing
- synthesize results into a summary of what is and is not known
- identify areas of controversy in the literature
- formulate questions that need further research
Why Conduct a Literature Review?
- to distinguish what has been done from what needs to be done
- to discover important variables relevant to the topic
- to synthesize and gain new perspective
- to identify relationships between ideas and practices
- to establish the context of the topic
- to rationalize the significance of the problem
- to enhance and acquire subject vocabulary
- to understand the structure of the subject
- tp relate ideas and theory to applications
- to identify main methodologies and research techniques that have been used
- to place research in a historical context to show familiarity with state-of-art development
Questions to Consider
- What is the overarching question or problem your literature review seeks to address?
- How much familiarity do you already have with the field? Are you already familiar with common methodologies or professional vocabularies?
- What types of strategies or questions have others in your field pursued?
- How will you synthesize or summarize the information you gather?
- What do you or others perceive to be lacking in your field?
- Is your topic broad? How could it be narrowed?
- Can you articulate why your topic is important in your field?
- Next: Sample Searches >>
- Last Updated: Feb 27, 2023 2:09 PM
- URL: https://researchguides.ben.edu/lit-review
Kindlon Hall 5700 College Rd. Lisle, IL 60532 (630) 829-6050
Gillett Hall 225 E. Main St. Mesa, AZ 85201 (480) 878-7514
A Survival Guide for Research Scientists pp 27–34 Cite as
Literature Review
- Ratna Tantra 2
- First Online: 01 September 2019
1190 Accesses
Doing a literature review is an integral part of research and yet it can be a daunting process. In this chapter, I will give you practical guidelines on how to conduct an effective literature review. Overall, the process can be divided into five main steps:
Come up with a statement of purpose, to establish why you need to do the review in the first place.
Come up with key words, so that you can plug these into search engines or scientific databases, to identify relevant papers.
Manage your search (through the use of a suitable reference software) and order your papers. The reference software will help you keep track on what literature you have, as well as allow you to cite them with ease when you write papers.
Read the papers and extract the information that you want.
Adopt an effective way to absorb information from your reading material, such as the use of a spider diagram in order to condense the information. Such a diagram will enable you to see connections between ideas/sub-ideas from different papers more clearly.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution .
Buying options
- Available as PDF
- Read on any device
- Instant download
- Own it forever
- Available as EPUB and PDF
- Compact, lightweight edition
- Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
- Free shipping worldwide - see info
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Aghaei Chadegani, A., Salehi, H., Md Yunus, M. M., Farhadi, H., Fooladi, M., Farhadi, M., et al. (2013). A comparison between two main academic literature collections: Web of science and Scopus databases. Asian Social Science, 9 (5), 18–26.
Google Scholar
College Library Services CSN. (n.d.). Databases vs. Search Engines: What’s the Difference? Retrieved January 8, 2018 from https://www.csn.edu/sites/default/files/legacy/PDFFiles/Library/dbasesearch3.pdf .
Durbin, C. G. (2009). How to read a scientific research paper. Respiratory Care, 54 , 1366–1371.
Espacenet - Home page. (n.d.). Retrieved March 19, 2018, from https://worldwide.espacenet.com/ .
European Patent Office, & European Commission. (2007). Why researchers should care about patents . European Commission, (pp. 1–8). Retrieved from http://ec.europa.eu/invest-in-research/pdf/download_en/patents_for_researchers.pdf .
Fink, A. (2005). Conducting research literature reviews: From the Internet to paper . Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications.
Google Patents. (n.d.). Retrieved January 8, 2018, from https://patents.google.com/ .
Khare, R., Leaman, R., & Lu, Z. (2014). Accessing biomedical literature in the current information landscape. Methods in Molecular Biology (Clifton, N.J.), 1159 , 11–31.
Article Google Scholar
Kramer, D. (2005). How to read a patent. ASHRAE Journal, 47 (5), 90–92.
O’Leary, Z. (2005). Researching real-world problems: A guide to methods of inquiry . Thousand Oaks: SAGE.
Shah, P. (1998). Successful study: The essential skills . Andover: Cengage Learning EMEA.
Tantra, R., Brown, R. J. C., Milton, M. J. T., & Gohil, D. (2008). A practical method to fabricate gold substrates for surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy. Applied Spectroscopy, 62 (9), 992–1000.
Article CAS Google Scholar
WIPO - Search International and National Patent Collections. (n.d.). Retrieved January 8, 2018, from https://patentscope.wipo.int/search/en/search.jsf .
Download references
Author information
Authors and affiliations.
Portsmouth, UK
Ratna Tantra
You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar
Rights and permissions
Reprints and permissions
Copyright information
© 2019 Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter.
Tantra, R. (2019). Literature Review. In: A Survival Guide for Research Scientists. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-05435-9_3
Download citation
DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-05435-9_3
Published : 01 September 2019
Publisher Name : Springer, Cham
Print ISBN : 978-3-030-05434-2
Online ISBN : 978-3-030-05435-9
eBook Packages : Chemistry and Materials Science Chemistry and Material Science (R0)
Share this chapter
Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:
Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.
Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative
- Publish with us
Policies and ethics
- Find a journal
- Track your research
Want to create or adapt books like this? Learn more about how Pressbooks supports open publishing practices.
What is a literature review?
A literature review is a critical analysis of the literature related to your research topic. It evaluates and critiques the literature to establish a theoretical framework for your research topic and/or identify a gap in the existing research that your research will address.
A literature review is not a summary of the literature. You need to engage deeply and critically with the literature. Your literature review should show your understanding of the literature related to your research topic and lead to presenting a rationale for your research.
A literature review focuses on:
- the context of the topic
- key concepts, ideas, theories and methodologies
- key researchers, texts and seminal works
- major issues and debates
- identifying conflicting evidence
- the main questions that have been asked around the topic
- the organisation of knowledge on the topic
- definitions, particularly those that are contested
- showing how your research will advance scholarly knowledge (generally referred to as identifying the ‘gap’).
This module will guide you through the functions of a literature review; the typical process of conducting a literature review (including searching for literature and taking notes); structuring your literature review within your thesis and organising its internal ideas; and styling the language of your literature review.
The purposes of a literature review
A literature review serves two main purposes:
1) To show awareness of the present state of knowledge in a particular field, including:
- seminal authors
- the main empirical research
- theoretical positions
- controversies
- breakthroughs as well as links to other related areas of knowledge.
2) To provide a foundation for the author’s research. To do that, the literature review needs to:
- help the researcher define a hypothesis or a research question, and how answering the question will contribute to the body of knowledge;
- provide a rationale for investigating the problem and the selected methodology;
- provide a particular theoretical lens, support the argument, or identify gaps.
Before you engage further with this module, try the quiz below to see how much you already know about literature reviews.
Research and Writing Skills for Academic and Graduate Researchers Copyright © 2022 by RMIT University is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.
Share This Book
Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library
- Collections
- Research Help
YSN Doctoral Programs: Steps in Conducting a Literature Review
- Biomedical Databases
- Global (Public Health) Databases
- Soc. Sci., History, and Law Databases
- Grey Literature
- Trials Registers
- Data and Statistics
- Public Policy
- Google Tips
- Recommended Books
- Steps in Conducting a Literature Review
What is a literature review?
A literature review is an integrated analysis -- not just a summary-- of scholarly writings and other relevant evidence related directly to your research question. That is, it represents a synthesis of the evidence that provides background information on your topic and shows a association between the evidence and your research question.
A literature review may be a stand alone work or the introduction to a larger research paper, depending on the assignment. Rely heavily on the guidelines your instructor has given you.
Why is it important?
A literature review is important because it:
- Explains the background of research on a topic.
- Demonstrates why a topic is significant to a subject area.
- Discovers relationships between research studies/ideas.
- Identifies major themes, concepts, and researchers on a topic.
- Identifies critical gaps and points of disagreement.
- Discusses further research questions that logically come out of the previous studies.
APA7 Style resources
APA Style Blog - for those harder to find answers
1. Choose a topic. Define your research question.
Your literature review should be guided by your central research question. The literature represents background and research developments related to a specific research question, interpreted and analyzed by you in a synthesized way.
- Make sure your research question is not too broad or too narrow. Is it manageable?
- Begin writing down terms that are related to your question. These will be useful for searches later.
- If you have the opportunity, discuss your topic with your professor and your class mates.
2. Decide on the scope of your review
How many studies do you need to look at? How comprehensive should it be? How many years should it cover?
- This may depend on your assignment. How many sources does the assignment require?
3. Select the databases you will use to conduct your searches.
Make a list of the databases you will search.
Where to find databases:
- use the tabs on this guide
- Find other databases in the Nursing Information Resources web page
- More on the Medical Library web page
- ... and more on the Yale University Library web page
4. Conduct your searches to find the evidence. Keep track of your searches.
- Use the key words in your question, as well as synonyms for those words, as terms in your search. Use the database tutorials for help.
- Save the searches in the databases. This saves time when you want to redo, or modify, the searches. It is also helpful to use as a guide is the searches are not finding any useful results.
- Review the abstracts of research studies carefully. This will save you time.
- Use the bibliographies and references of research studies you find to locate others.
- Check with your professor, or a subject expert in the field, if you are missing any key works in the field.
- Ask your librarian for help at any time.
- Use a citation manager, such as EndNote as the repository for your citations. See the EndNote tutorials for help.
Review the literature
Some questions to help you analyze the research:
- What was the research question of the study you are reviewing? What were the authors trying to discover?
- Was the research funded by a source that could influence the findings?
- What were the research methodologies? Analyze its literature review, the samples and variables used, the results, and the conclusions.
- Does the research seem to be complete? Could it have been conducted more soundly? What further questions does it raise?
- If there are conflicting studies, why do you think that is?
- How are the authors viewed in the field? Has this study been cited? If so, how has it been analyzed?
Tips:
- Review the abstracts carefully.
- Keep careful notes so that you may track your thought processes during the research process.
- Create a matrix of the studies for easy analysis, and synthesis, across all of the studies.
- << Previous: Recommended Books
- Last Updated: Jan 4, 2024 10:52 AM
- URL: https://guides.library.yale.edu/YSNDoctoral
Home of Mass Communication Research Topics in Nigeria
No.1 Mass Communication Research Topics and Materials
BENEFITS OF LITERATURE REVIEW TO RESEARCH
Introduction.
Literature review offers lots of benefits to researcher. However, for the purpose of this post I will like to be direct. Below are few benefits of Literature review to researchers:
- A thorough exploration of the literature review will help to articulate our own research problems, objectives, as well as formulating our research questions or hypothesis.
- It helps to know the existing GAPS
- It helps to notices the important concepts and variables and how they were operationalized
- It widens the researcher knowledge of the problem
- It gives researchers detailed knowledge of the method and design that he can adopt or use new ones.
- It helps the researcher to arrive at picking a suitable scope
- It suggested theories previously used
Related Project Topics:
What is a Headline?
(Last Updated On: ) Meaning of Headline A headline is that bold caption of a news story in few words which draws attention to the
IMPACT OF NAIRA REDESIGN IN CURBING VOTE BUYING DURING ELECTION IN NIGERIA
(Last Updated On: ) Abstract ON VOTE BUYING The main objective of the study was to investigate impact of naira redesign in curbing vote buying
INFLUENCE OF SOCIAL MEDIA IN INTERPERSONAL COMMUNICATION AMONG YOUTHS IN NIGERIA
(Last Updated On: ) Abstract on interpersonal communication The study investigates influence of social media in interpersonal communication among youths in Nigeria. This study is
INFLUENCE OF SOCIAL MEDIA ON AWARENESS AND MITIGATION OF CHILD LABOUR & CHILD ABUSE IN NIGERIA
(Last Updated On: ) CHILD LABOUR & CHILD ABUSE CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION 1.1 Background to the study According to the International Labour Organization in 2010,
What is Publics in Public Relations ?
(Last Updated On: ) Definition of Publics in Public Relations ? Publics in public relations is a professional term which refers to the different sections
20 Applications of Computer in Mass Media
(Last Updated On: ) The application of computers in mass media has revolutionized the way information is created, disseminated, and consumed. This integration has significantly
Definition of Theories of state formation
(Last Updated On: ) What are Theories of state formation Examples include the Divine Right Theory, Social Contract Theory, Warfare and Conquest Theory, Evolutionary Theory,
EFFECTIVENESS OF THE INTERNET AS A MEANS OF INFORMATION SHARING AMONG UNILAG STUDENTS
(Last Updated On: ) Abstract on Information Sharing The study was to investigate the effectiveness of the internet as a means of information sharing among UNILAG
INFLUENCE OF ADVERT RECALL STRATEGIES ON STUDENTS RECALL AND PATRONAGE OF GOODS AND SERVICES
(Last Updated On: ) PREAMBLE ON ADVERT RECALL The impact of advertising recall strategies on students is pivotal in shaping their awareness and preference for
INFLUENCE OF LUSH HAIR TELEVISION ADVERTISEMENT ON THE BUYING HABIT AMONG FEMALE STUDENTS
(Last Updated On: ) Abstract The study investigated influence of lush hair television advertisement on the buying habit among female students University of Lagos. The
CHALLENGES & OPPORTUNITIES OF INTERNET IN RURAL AREAS
(Last Updated On: ) Abstract: The core objective of the study is to investigates the challenges and opportunities of internet in rural areas of Inna
ROLE OF JINGLES IN THE SUSTENANCE OF A RADIO STATION IN NIGERIA
(Last Updated On: ) JINGLES Table of Contents Introduction Different Departments in Radio Station Marketing Department and Revenue Generation Responsibility Advertisement and Mass Media Concept
Call : 08033061386, Whatsapp : 07033401559, Email : [email protected]
Address: No. 2, His Grace Shopping Complex, Ramat Junction, Ayeekale, Osogbo, Osun State, Nigeria.
In order to help minimize spread of the coronavirus and protect our campus community, Cowles Library is adjusting our services, hours, and building access. Read more...
- Research, Study, Learning
- Archives & Special Collections
- Cowles Library
- Find Journal Articles
- Find Articles in Related Disciplines
- Find Streaming Video
- Conducting a Literature Review
- Organizations, Associations, Societies
- For Faculty
What is a Literature Review?
Description.
A literature review, also called a review article or review of literature, surveys the existing research on a topic. The term "literature" in this context refers to published research or scholarship in a particular discipline, rather than "fiction" (like American Literature) or an individual work of literature. In general, literature reviews are most common in the sciences and social sciences.
Literature reviews may be written as standalone works, or as part of a scholarly article or research paper. In either case, the purpose of the review is to summarize and synthesize the key scholarly work that has already been done on the topic at hand. The literature review may also include some analysis and interpretation. A literature review is not a summary of every piece of scholarly research on a topic.
Why are literature reviews useful?
Literature reviews can be very helpful for newer researchers or those unfamiliar with a field by synthesizing the existing research on a given topic, providing the reader with connections and relationships among previous scholarship. Reviews can also be useful to veteran researchers by identifying potentials gaps in the research or steering future research questions toward unexplored areas. If a literature review is part of a scholarly article, it should include an explanation of how the current article adds to the conversation. (From: https://researchguides.drake.edu/englit/criticism)
How is a literature review different from a research article?
Research articles: "are empirical articles that describe one or several related studies on a specific, quantitative, testable research question....they are typically organized into four text sections: Introduction, Methods, Results, Discussion." Source: https://psych.uw.edu/storage/writing_center/litrev.pdf)
Steps for Writing a Literature Review
1. Identify and define the topic that you will be reviewing.
The topic, which is commonly a research question (or problem) of some kind, needs to be identified and defined as clearly as possible. You need to have an idea of what you will be reviewing in order to effectively search for references and to write a coherent summary of the research on it. At this stage it can be helpful to write down a description of the research question, area, or topic that you will be reviewing, as well as to identify any keywords that you will be using to search for relevant research.
2. Conduct a Literature Search
Use a range of keywords to search databases such as PsycINFO and any others that may contain relevant articles. You should focus on peer-reviewed, scholarly articles . In SuperSearch and most databases, you may find it helpful to select the Advanced Search mode and include "literature review" or "review of the literature" in addition to your other search terms. Published books may also be helpful, but keep in mind that peer-reviewed articles are widely considered to be the “gold standard” of scientific research. Read through titles and abstracts, select and obtain articles (that is, download, copy, or print them out), and save your searches as needed. Most of the databases you will need are linked to from the Cowles Library Psychology Research guide .
3. Read through the research that you have found and take notes.
Absorb as much information as you can. Read through the articles and books that you have found, and as you do, take notes. The notes should include anything that will be helpful in advancing your own thinking about the topic and in helping you write the literature review (such as key points, ideas, or even page numbers that index key information). Some references may turn out to be more helpful than others; you may notice patterns or striking contrasts between different sources; and some sources may refer to yet other sources of potential interest. This is often the most time-consuming part of the review process. However, it is also where you get to learn about the topic in great detail. You may want to use a Citation Manager to help you keep track of the citations you have found.
4. Organize your notes and thoughts; create an outline.
At this stage, you are close to writing the review itself. However, it is often helpful to first reflect on all the reading that you have done. What patterns stand out? Do the different sources converge on a consensus? Or not? What unresolved questions still remain? You should look over your notes (it may also be helpful to reorganize them), and as you do, to think about how you will present this research in your literature review. Are you going to summarize or critically evaluate? Are you going to use a chronological or other type of organizational structure? It can also be helpful to create an outline of how your literature review will be structured.
5. Write the literature review itself and edit and revise as needed.
The final stage involves writing. When writing, keep in mind that literature reviews are generally characterized by a summary style in which prior research is described sufficiently to explain critical findings but does not include a high level of detail (if readers want to learn about all the specific details of a study, then they can look up the references that you cite and read the original articles themselves). However, the degree of emphasis that is given to individual studies may vary (more or less detail may be warranted depending on how critical or unique a given study was). After you have written a first draft, you should read it carefully and then edit and revise as needed. You may need to repeat this process more than once. It may be helpful to have another person read through your draft(s) and provide feedback.
6. Incorporate the literature review into your research paper draft. (note: this step is only if you are using the literature review to write a research paper. Many times the literature review is an end unto itself).
After the literature review is complete, you should incorporate it into your research paper (if you are writing the review as one component of a larger paper). Depending on the stage at which your paper is at, this may involve merging your literature review into a partially complete Introduction section, writing the rest of the paper around the literature review, or other processes.
These steps were taken from: https://psychology.ucsd.edu/undergraduate-program/undergraduate-resources/academic-writing-resources/writing-research-papers/writing-lit-review.html#6.-Incorporate-the-literature-r
- << Previous: Find Streaming Video
- Next: Organizations, Associations, Societies >>
- Last Updated: Feb 29, 2024 4:09 PM
- URL: https://researchguides.drake.edu/psychology
- 2507 University Avenue
- Des Moines, IA 50311
- (515) 271-2111
Trouble finding something? Try searching , or check out the Get Help page.
An official website of the United States government
The .gov means it’s official. Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.
The site is secure. The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.
- Publications
- Account settings
Preview improvements coming to the PMC website in October 2024. Learn More or Try it out now .
- Advanced Search
- Journal List
- J Grad Med Educ
- v.8(3); 2016 Jul
The Literature Review: A Foundation for High-Quality Medical Education Research
a These are subscription resources. Researchers should check with their librarian to determine their access rights.
Despite a surge in published scholarship in medical education 1 and rapid growth in journals that publish educational research, manuscript acceptance rates continue to fall. 2 Failure to conduct a thorough, accurate, and up-to-date literature review identifying an important problem and placing the study in context is consistently identified as one of the top reasons for rejection. 3 , 4 The purpose of this editorial is to provide a road map and practical recommendations for planning a literature review. By understanding the goals of a literature review and following a few basic processes, authors can enhance both the quality of their educational research and the likelihood of publication in the Journal of Graduate Medical Education ( JGME ) and in other journals.
The Literature Review Defined
In medical education, no organization has articulated a formal definition of a literature review for a research paper; thus, a literature review can take a number of forms. Depending on the type of article, target journal, and specific topic, these forms will vary in methodology, rigor, and depth. Several organizations have published guidelines for conducting an intensive literature search intended for formal systematic reviews, both broadly (eg, PRISMA) 5 and within medical education, 6 and there are excellent commentaries to guide authors of systematic reviews. 7 , 8
- A literature review forms the basis for high-quality medical education research and helps maximize relevance, originality, generalizability, and impact.
- A literature review provides context, informs methodology, maximizes innovation, avoids duplicative research, and ensures that professional standards are met.
- Literature reviews take time, are iterative, and should continue throughout the research process.
- Researchers should maximize the use of human resources (librarians, colleagues), search tools (databases/search engines), and existing literature (related articles).
- Keeping organized is critical.
Such work is outside the scope of this article, which focuses on literature reviews to inform reports of original medical education research. We define such a literature review as a synthetic review and summary of what is known and unknown regarding the topic of a scholarly body of work, including the current work's place within the existing knowledge . While this type of literature review may not require the intensive search processes mandated by systematic reviews, it merits a thoughtful and rigorous approach.
Purpose and Importance of the Literature Review
An understanding of the current literature is critical for all phases of a research study. Lingard 9 recently invoked the “journal-as-conversation” metaphor as a way of understanding how one's research fits into the larger medical education conversation. As she described it: “Imagine yourself joining a conversation at a social event. After you hang about eavesdropping to get the drift of what's being said (the conversational equivalent of the literature review), you join the conversation with a contribution that signals your shared interest in the topic, your knowledge of what's already been said, and your intention.” 9
The literature review helps any researcher “join the conversation” by providing context, informing methodology, identifying innovation, minimizing duplicative research, and ensuring that professional standards are met. Understanding the current literature also promotes scholarship, as proposed by Boyer, 10 by contributing to 5 of the 6 standards by which scholarly work should be evaluated. 11 Specifically, the review helps the researcher (1) articulate clear goals, (2) show evidence of adequate preparation, (3) select appropriate methods, (4) communicate relevant results, and (5) engage in reflective critique.
Failure to conduct a high-quality literature review is associated with several problems identified in the medical education literature, including studies that are repetitive, not grounded in theory, methodologically weak, and fail to expand knowledge beyond a single setting. 12 Indeed, medical education scholars complain that many studies repeat work already published and contribute little new knowledge—a likely cause of which is failure to conduct a proper literature review. 3 , 4
Likewise, studies that lack theoretical grounding or a conceptual framework make study design and interpretation difficult. 13 When theory is used in medical education studies, it is often invoked at a superficial level. As Norman 14 noted, when theory is used appropriately, it helps articulate variables that might be linked together and why, and it allows the researcher to make hypotheses and define a study's context and scope. Ultimately, a proper literature review is a first critical step toward identifying relevant conceptual frameworks.
Another problem is that many medical education studies are methodologically weak. 12 Good research requires trained investigators who can articulate relevant research questions, operationally define variables of interest, and choose the best method for specific research questions. Conducting a proper literature review helps both novice and experienced researchers select rigorous research methodologies.
Finally, many studies in medical education are “one-offs,” that is, single studies undertaken because the opportunity presented itself locally. Such studies frequently are not oriented toward progressive knowledge building and generalization to other settings. A firm grasp of the literature can encourage a programmatic approach to research.
Approaching the Literature Review
Considering these issues, journals have a responsibility to demand from authors a thoughtful synthesis of their study's position within the field, and it is the authors' responsibility to provide such a synthesis, based on a literature review. The aforementioned purposes of the literature review mandate that the review occurs throughout all phases of a study, from conception and design, to implementation and analysis, to manuscript preparation and submission.
Planning the literature review requires understanding of journal requirements, which vary greatly by journal ( table 1 ). Authors are advised to take note of common problems with reporting results of the literature review. Table 2 lists the most common problems that we have encountered as authors, reviewers, and editors.
Sample of Journals' Author Instructions for Literature Reviews Conducted as Part of Original Research Article a
Common Problem Areas for Reporting Literature Reviews in the Context of Scholarly Articles
Locating and Organizing the Literature
Three resources may facilitate identifying relevant literature: human resources, search tools, and related literature. As the process requires time, it is important to begin searching for literature early in the process (ie, the study design phase). Identifying and understanding relevant studies will increase the likelihood of designing a relevant, adaptable, generalizable, and novel study that is based on educational or learning theory and can maximize impact.
Human Resources
A medical librarian can help translate research interests into an effective search strategy, familiarize researchers with available information resources, provide information on organizing information, and introduce strategies for keeping current with emerging research. Often, librarians are also aware of research across their institutions and may be able to connect researchers with similar interests. Reaching out to colleagues for suggestions may help researchers quickly locate resources that would not otherwise be on their radar.
During this process, researchers will likely identify other researchers writing on aspects of their topic. Researchers should consider searching for the publications of these relevant researchers (see table 3 for search strategies). Additionally, institutional websites may include curriculum vitae of such relevant faculty with access to their entire publication record, including difficult to locate publications, such as book chapters, dissertations, and technical reports.
Strategies for Finding Related Researcher Publications in Databases and Search Engines
Search Tools and Related Literature
Researchers will locate the majority of needed information using databases and search engines. Excellent resources are available to guide researchers in the mechanics of literature searches. 15 , 16
Because medical education research draws on a variety of disciplines, researchers should include search tools with coverage beyond medicine (eg, psychology, nursing, education, and anthropology) and that cover several publication types, such as reports, standards, conference abstracts, and book chapters (see the box for several information resources). Many search tools include options for viewing citations of selected articles. Examining cited references provides additional articles for review and a sense of the influence of the selected article on its field.
Box Information Resources
- Web of Science a
- Education Resource Information Center (ERIC)
- Cumulative Index of Nursing & Allied Health (CINAHL) a
- Google Scholar
Once relevant articles are located, it is useful to mine those articles for additional citations. One strategy is to examine references of key articles, especially review articles, for relevant citations.
Getting Organized
As the aforementioned resources will likely provide a tremendous amount of information, organization is crucial. Researchers should determine which details are most important to their study (eg, participants, setting, methods, and outcomes) and generate a strategy for keeping those details organized and accessible. Increasingly, researchers utilize digital tools, such as Evernote, to capture such information, which enables accessibility across digital workspaces and search capabilities. Use of citation managers can also be helpful as they store citations and, in some cases, can generate bibliographies ( table 4 ).
Citation Managers
Knowing When to Say When
Researchers often ask how to know when they have located enough citations. Unfortunately, there is no magic or ideal number of citations to collect. One strategy for checking coverage of the literature is to inspect references of relevant articles. As researchers review references they will start noticing a repetition of the same articles with few new articles appearing. This can indicate that the researcher has covered the literature base on a particular topic.
Putting It All Together
In preparing to write a research paper, it is important to consider which citations to include and how they will inform the introduction and discussion sections. The “Instructions to Authors” for the targeted journal will often provide guidance on structuring the literature review (or introduction) and the number of total citations permitted for each article category. Reviewing articles of similar type published in the targeted journal can also provide guidance regarding structure and average lengths of the introduction and discussion sections.
When selecting references for the introduction consider those that illustrate core background theoretical and methodological concepts, as well as recent relevant studies. The introduction should be brief and present references not as a laundry list or narrative of available literature, but rather as a synthesized summary to provide context for the current study and to identify the gap in the literature that the study intends to fill. For the discussion, citations should be thoughtfully selected to compare and contrast the present study's findings with the current literature and to indicate how the present study moves the field forward.
To facilitate writing a literature review, journals are increasingly providing helpful features to guide authors. For example, the resources available through JGME include several articles on writing. 17 The journal Perspectives on Medical Education recently launched “The Writer's Craft,” which is intended to help medical educators improve their writing. Additionally, many institutions have writing centers that provide web-based materials on writing a literature review, and some even have writing coaches.
The literature review is a vital part of medical education research and should occur throughout the research process to help researchers design a strong study and effectively communicate study results and importance. To achieve these goals, researchers are advised to plan and execute the literature review carefully. The guidance in this editorial provides considerations and recommendations that may improve the quality of literature reviews.
MINI REVIEW article
Intertemporal prosocial behavior: a review and research agenda.
- 1 Department of Management and Engineering, Division of Economics, Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden
- 2 Department of Health, Medicine and Caring Sciences (HMV), The National Center for Priority Setting in Health Care, Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden
- 3 Department of Behavioural Sciences and Learning, Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden
- 4 Decision Research, Eugene, OR, United States
Research on intertemporal and prosocial decisions has largely developed in separate strands of literature. However, many of the decisions we make occur at the intersection of these two dimensions (intertemporal and prosocial). Trust is an example, where a decision today is made with the expectation that another person will reciprocate (or betray) later. A new literature is emerging to explore the role of time in these types of situations, where time and social considerations are intertwined. In many cases, time introduces (or magnifies) an element of uncertainty about future outcomes and utility that people need to deal with – what will happen, how good will it be, how will it feel. We review this emerging literature on intertemporal prosocial decision-making and discuss how new research can fill existing knowledge gaps.
1 Introduction
Time is a fundamental component in human behavior and interaction. Decisions, desires, views, experiences, and emotions act on and play out over time. Social norms evolve. Societies change. For these reasons, studying how prosocial decisions (here interpreted broadly as decisions affecting and being affected by others) are shaped by time, using controlled experiments, and developing theory, seems important. However, historically this perspective has received little attention. The literatures on intertemporal and prosocial decisions, although each large and vibrant, have mostly developed without significant transfer between them.
Lately, this perplexing isolation between research fields has begun to change. A new literature is emerging at the intersection of temporal and prosocial behavior. What “prosocial” brings to the table here is, primarily, that these decisions often involve a strategic component, where outcomes depend on decisions and expectations by more than one individual; and are to a greater degree influenced by context, norms, personal and social identity. These aspects of decision-making are amenable to time. For example, if people have different motivations for delayed rewards (discounting), then simply adding a time delay to a classic bargaining- or coordination game may substantially change the strategic landscape (and the corresponding game predictions).
Here, we review this emerging literature on intertemporal prosocial decision-making and discuss several promising directions for new research.
2 Emerging literature on intertemporal prosocial decision-making
The core research strategy for most papers in this emerging field has been to add a time delay to a standard prosocial decision-context normally run in the lab, e.g., a trust-, cooperation-, coordination-, or bargaining game. This has produced some thought-provoking findings and predictions, including that small differences in time preference may improve coordination and influence bargaining power (about resource distribution), but also that time may act as a barrier to cooperation. Moreover, initial results indicate that trust and trustworthiness is surprisingly robust to time delay, at least for short delays, and that altruism follows a different intertemporal pattern compared to decisions that are purely personal, including absence of classical time-inconsistent choosing.
Agranov et al. (2023) investigated how differential time preferences influenced coordination. They used a standard protocol for repeated coordination, where participants make decisions over many rounds and continuation is probabilistic. Interestingly, allowing for even a small difference in time preference influenced outcomes (fewer coordination failures), likely working as a coordination anchor; and larger differences gave rise to intertemporal trades, where individuals with steeper discounting received higher payoffs early on, and vice versa for individuals with less steep discounting.
Kim et al. (2023) used a similar approach allowing for discounting differentials to investigate the effect on bargaining behavior. In their experiment, participants bargained repeatedly (submitting alternating offers) about how to share a fix sum of money. Any offer that was rejected triggered a new round of bargaining but also pushed eventual payout further into the future. Here, patience is strategically relevant since it is less costly for more patient players to ‘wait’ for a good offer. Theoretically, opposing players who are less patient should recognize and submit better offers upfront. The results showed that players who faced a longer payoff delay (thus steeper effective discounting) indeed submitted less demanding proposals and enjoyed less favorable outcomes overall.
Two papers investigated the effects of time delay on cooperation. Kim (2023) incorporated time delay in payoffs in a repeated prisoner’s dilemma game. They used a classic repeated-games framework but with the temporal sequence of stage games mapped to staggered payouts for weeks or months, rather than all at once received immediately at the end of the experiment. There was lower cooperation when payoffs were delayed more, thus indicating that steeper discounting decreases cooperation in a repeated games framework. Kölle and Laurer (2024) investigated the effects of time delay on various payoff components in a linear public goods game. In the classic version of this game, participants can keep money for themselves or contribute to a common account that benefits everyone in the group. The parameters are usually set such that it is individually optimal for selfish persons to keep all money for themselves, but socially optimal if everyone contributes fully to the group account. Here, the authors systematically varied which type of benefit (personal, group, none, or both) that was paid immediately and which was paid with a 1 year delay. They found overall substantially lower cooperation rates when group benefits were delayed, and, conversely, increased cooperation when personal benefits were delayed instead. Together these studies suggest that time may act as a barrier to cooperation in the context of solving collective problems, like climate change.
Ederer and Schneider (2022) introduced a time dimension in the classic trust game. Unlike the papers surveyed above, here they kept delay to payout constant but instead systematically varied delay to decision. In the trust game, one player (the ‘trustor’) is given a sum of money and decides how much to send to another player, the ‘trustee.’ The amount sent is multiplied and then the trustee decides how much, if anything, to return to the trustor. Using a variant of this game, Ederer and Schneider introduced delay to the trustee’s decision. Participants as trustors thus decided how much to send to their assigned trustees knowing that the trustee would make their decisions either immediately, 1 day after the experiment, or in 3 weeks’ time. They speculate that trustees’ potential feelings of obligation or guilt might decrease as temporal distance (time since trustor’s decision) increases, and as a result, observed trustworthiness and trust should decrease. However, neither trust nor trustworthiness changed substantially for the delays considered in the experiment (max 3 weeks).
Finally, some papers have investigated the temporal dimension of altruistic behavior. Kölle and Wenner (2023) studied how people allocate effort (for payment) for themselves and others inside a time window of 3 weeks, using a task developed to measure time inconsistency ( Augenblick et al., 2015 ). In short, time inconsistency here means disproportionate valuation of rewards that are immediately available. The novel idea here was that people made temporal allocations not only for themselves but also for others and in particular for self vs. other. In line with previous literature (non-social decisions), they found evidence of time inconsistency when choosing for oneself. However, these results did not extend to choices for others or for self-other tradeoffs. The authors concluded that discounting in social situations appears to be conceptually different from personal discounting. Chopra et al. (2024) also investigated the temporal structure of self-other tradeoffs but used a different design, with substantially longer time frames (up to 1 year) and monetary donations to charity. Interestingly, they found that prosocial decisions in the form of self-other tradeoffs had a distinct temporal profile beyond people’s discounting in either domain (self and other when considered separately) and controlling for their atemporal preference for giving in this context. The authors interpreted this as the upshot of a conceptual distinction between temporal utility flows from consequences vs. choices ( Kovarik, 2009 ; Andreoni and Serra-Garcia, 2021 on the role of time in altruistic behavior).
3 Recent advances in the intertemporal choice literature
Discounting of future monetary rewards is probably one of the most well-researched topics in behavioral social science, and the literature is very active. Over the years a number of stylized patterns have been documented using experiments, e.g., hyperbolicity (i.e., insensitivity to the length of time intervals) and present bias (i.e., disproportionate valuation of immediate rewards), and different theories have been developed to explain them (see, e.g., review by Cohen et al., 2020 ). Traditionally, most of these explanations have focused on motivational factors – deep preference for sooner rewards, self-control failures, impulsivity ( Enke et al., 2023 ).
Interestingly, a newer set of papers has emphasized and begun to formalize temporal discounting from a different explanatory perspective, resulting from ‘cognitive noise’ or decision complexity. Gabaix and Laibson (2022) model temporal discounting as resulting from internal uncertainty about value of future events. Decision makers handle this uncertainty by generating noisy mental simulations of future value, which they combine with their prior beliefs. If noise increases with the horizon (time to delivery) this produces a classic discounting pattern, where future rewards are valued less, even for agents who have no real time preference. Vieider (2021) develops a discounting model based on a similar type of cognitive micro-foundation and Bayesian updating approach, except uncertainty here is tied to perception of time delay rather than future utilities. Gershman and Bhui (2020) extend Gabaix and Laibson’s baseline model to account for adaptive simulation noise. Assuming that attention to signals (mental representations of future utility) is costly, people will “think harder” when potential utility is larger and thus appear to adapt their discounting to reward magnitude, which reproduces a stylized discounting pattern known as ‘the magnitude effect.’ Enke et al. (2023) and Enke and Graeber (2023) operate along the same lines but also make a broader methodological point, noting that temporal choices belong to a class of complex decision problems where people may be reluctant, or unable, to engage in the type of cognitive operations required for optimal choice, and rather resort to simpler decision rules. And many of these rules will produce choice patterns that look like classic discounting even when this is not the underlying value guiding people’s choices.
These developments in the intertemporal choice literature may prove useful for understanding how prosocial decisions are made in an intertemporal context. Because both dimensions (intertemporal and prosocial, respectively) can be conceptualized in terms of mental perspective taking, focusing on current vs. future, or self vs. other. This idea is already a conceptual cornerstone for prosocial decisions, where it is important to understand how somebody else will feel, think, and react, and thus well aligned with the idea (echoed by some of the papers reviewed above) that intertemporal choices are influenced by the extent to which people can understand how something will be or play out in the future.
4 Research agenda
This new literature on intertemporal prosocial decision-making is just emerging and there are many open questions to address. A first line of inquiry should build on the ideas introduced in the papers written so far, where the focus has been to explore how an added time dimension changes the strategic landscape and what observable effects this may have on behavior. This is an exciting topic where much more research is needed, both to replicate patterns that emerged from the few existing studies and to extend to other contexts.
A second aspect to explore is temporal direction; what happens if decisions are extending into the past compared to into the future? Of course, answering this question will require some elaborate experimental-design work, but it is an important perspective to consider. It applies to most games where decisions (thus not only outcomes) are detached in time. The trust game is an example, where the trustor sees to the future but the trustee sees to the past. Conceptually it is not evident that the past and the future are symmetrically perceived. For instance, whereas the present can be experienced, the past and the future have to be mentally constructed ( Trope and Liberman, 2010 ). The source of these construals will be based on memory and imagination (prediction), the past, arguably, to a greater extent on memory, and the future on prediction ( Schacter et al., 2017 ). Down the line there will be interesting connections to be made with literatures on motivated memory and experience-based prediction.
A third, more fundamental task is to start building a conceptual home ground for prosocial decision-making in a temporal context. There is currently no established, unifying conceptual framework. This is not surprising, given that both temporal and prosocial decision-making are complex matters on their own, with a host of different theories existing in either domain, and these theories often rest on different psychological and neural foundations. However, eventually we need to break new ground here. A valuable first step in this process would be to shift focus a little bit by starting to collect large amounts of data within subjects, with the goal of building, and eventually estimating, temporal profiles of prosocial behavior in different contexts. The blueprint would be a densely populated (many different delays) delay discounting task adapted to prosocial choices. These profiles would then form the basis for exploring the effects of different experimental manipulations or looking for differences related to quantitative trait.
Going forward, one possible way to bridge the divide between prior separate conceptualizations of prosocial and temporal choice is to look to new conceptual work in the intertemporal choice literature (reviewed in short above), which emphasizes the role of noisy cognition (and decision complexity) in temporal discounting. One interesting line of thinking here is that decision makers may try to resolve uncertainty about the future by using mental simulations (what will happen, how good will it be, how will I feel), and that this results in temporal discounting. The focus on mental perspective-taking (mental simulations) for temporal decisions is key here because it is conceptually well aligned with the type of cognitive processes we typically attribute to prosocial decisions – “mentalizing” about what we believe other persons will do, how they will feel, what they expect from us, and so on ( Chang et al., 2023 ). This suggests a basic hypothesis about shared substrates in mental perspective taking that are relevant for prosocial decision-making in an intertemporal context. There are many ways in which new research could seek more evidence for (or refute) this hypothesis. One way would be to systematically manipulate temporal distance using episodic time cues ( Peters and Büchel, 2010 ) or emotional salience, e.g., fear of betrayal in the trust game, which should both have a predictable temporal component in their influence on behavior. Ideally this approach is then combined with a search for underlying neural mechanisms, which we touch on briefly below.
An emerging hypothesis in decision neuroscience is that overlapping brain networks are involved in both prosocial and intertemporal decisions. Correlational studies using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) have shown that a specific set of brain areas are consistently activated for prosocial decisions, often referred to as the social brain network (or the mentalizing network) ( Alós-Ferrer and Farolfi, 2019 ; Chang et al., 2023 ). A key functionality facilitated by this network is the cognitive ability to understand and predict other persons’ intentions, beliefs, and actions; a form of mental perspective taking that is crucial for beneficial social interaction. Of note, a similar type of functionality (using a shared neural implementation) is thought to be operating also in temporal decisions ( Soutschek et al., 2016 ). Here the hypothesis is that the mentalizing network enables future perspective taking, thus influencing the extent to which the future is valued, from today’s perspective. This points to a novel mechanism that is quite different from classic temptation/self-control models of intertemporal choice.
Current thinking is that the regions involved in prosocial or temporal decision-making (e.g., the temporoparietal junction or the partially overlapping angular gyrus) provide higher-order cognitive functions that facilitate integration of multisensory input, and that this functionality is particularly useful when building mental representations of complex phenomena, like social context or temporal projection ( Jung et al., 2022 ; Humphreys and Tibon, 2023 ; Lugrin et al., 2023 ). Consistent with this conceptualization, Pietrzak et al. (2023) found that neural activity in angular gyrus and surrounding areas correlated with decisions in a standard temporal discounting task. An interesting and important avenue for future research is thus to establish the casual role (and connectivity) of key regions in the mentalizing network for prosocial decisions made in a temporal context.
5 Discussion
An exciting new literature is emerging at the intersection of temporal and prosocial decision-making. Our review highlighted directions this literature is taking and we discussed knowledge gaps to be filled by future research. Most of our focus was on the need for in-depth understanding of decisions and underlying processes, including unifying conceptualization. Ultimately such deeper understanding will be needed for extrapolating findings to the world outside the experimental lab. And this is where this new literature becomes relevant for real – because the intertemporal prosocial dimension is present in some of today’s biggest societal challenges. How to find behavioral solutions that can speed up climate change mitigation is perhaps the clearest example. Time is important here because costs will be borne now and benefits in the future. Same for health policy, which discounts the lives of future generations. And both of these decisions are made in a social context.
In the behavioral social-science literature, bottom-up climate change mitigation is often cast in a cooperation/social-dilemma type of framework. Here, the key problem for mitigation is the tension that exists between individually optimal behavior (selfishness) and socially optimal behavior (full cooperation). An important question for policy is therefore how to make people more cooperative, and when it comes to environment this often means increase willingness to bear personal costs of climate-friendly actions incurred today (e.g., price, effort, comfort) for common benefits at some point in the future. As noted by the few papers we surveyed on this topic above, time is important to consider here because willingness to cooperate is plausibly influenced by when the benefit (e.g., global warming kept below 1.5°C) is expected to materialize, or when everyone else make their decisions (e.g., overexploitation is often temporally detached among different actors). More research here can help us design better interventions to tackle these problems.
Of course, climate action is not the only topic where understanding the role of time is important. Motivated beliefs, teamwork, trust, economic hold-up are other examples where social outcomes are plausibly shaped by time. We anticipate new exciting research on these and other topics over the coming years, as the emerging literature on intertemporal prosocial choice continues to grow.
For policymaking, the question how to think about time in prosocial decision-making is not only relevant from a behavioral-descriptive point of view; it is also a highly normative matter, which has consequences for the well-being of both current and future generations. Increased knowledge about when and why time shapes behavior and preferences for policy is just a first step when discussing the more fundamental question of when and why time preferences should shape behavior and public policy. How prosocial choices are shaped by time in an intergenerational context is also a question of utmost importance not only for future generations but for the structure of governance if modern democracy as a mechanism for public decision-making is insufficiently sensitive to the concerns of future generations.
Author contributions
EP: Writing – original draft, Conceptualization. GT: Writing – review & editing, Conceptualization. DV: Writing – review & editing, Conceptualization.
The author(s) declare that no financial support was received for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Conflict of interest
The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.
Publisher’s note
All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article, or claim that may be made by its manufacturer, is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.
Agranov, M., Kim, J., and Yariv, L. (2023). Coordination with Differential Time Preferences: Experimental Evidence. CESifo Working Paper 10454. Available at: https://ideas.repec.org/p/ces/ceswps/_10454.html (Accessed March 29, 2024).
Google Scholar
Alós-Ferrer, C., and Farolfi, F. (2019). Trust games and beyond. Front. Neurosci. 13:887. doi: 10.3389/fnins.2019.00887
PubMed Abstract | Crossref Full Text | Google Scholar
Andreoni, J., and Serra-Garcia, M. (2021). Time inconsistent charitable giving. J. Public Econ. 198:104391. doi: 10.1016/j.jpubeco.2021.104391
Crossref Full Text | Google Scholar
Augenblick, N., Niederle, M., and Sprenger, C. (2015). Working over time: dynamic inconsistency in real effort tasks. Q. J. Econ. 130, 1067–1115. doi: 10.1093/qje/qjv020
Chang, L.-A., Armaos, K., Warns, L., Ma de Sousa, A. Q., Paauwe, F., Scholz, C., et al. (2023). Mentalizing in an economic games context is associated with enhanced activation and connectivity in the left temporoparietal junction. Soc. Cogn. Affect. Neurosci. 18:nsad023. doi: 10.1093/scan/nsad023
Chopra, F., Falk, A., and Graeber, T. (2024). Intertemporal altruism. Am. Econ. J. Microeconomics 16, 329–357. doi: 10.1257/mic.20210319
Cohen, J. D., Ericson, K. M., Laibson, D., and White, J. M. (2020). Measuring time preferences. J. Econ. Lit. 58, 299–347. doi: 10.1257/jel.20191074
Ederer, F., and Schneider, F. (2022). Trust and promises over time. Am Econ J Microeconomics 14, 304–320. doi: 10.1257/mic.20200049
Enke, B., and Graeber, T. (2023). Cognitive uncertainty. Q. J. Econ. 138, 2021–2067. doi: 10.1093/qje/qjad025
Enke, B., Graeber, T., and Oprea, R. (2023). Complexity and Time. NBER Working Paper.
Gabaix, X., and Laibson, D. (2022). Myopia and Discounting. NBER Working Paper.
Gershman, S. J., and Bhui, R. (2020). Rationally inattentive intertemporal choice. Nature. Communications 11:3365. doi: 10.1038/s41467-020-16852-y
Humphreys, G. F., and Tibon, R. (2023). Dual-axes of functional organisation across lateral parietal cortex: the angular gyrus forms part of a multi-modal buffering system. Brain Struct. Funct. 228, 341–352. doi: 10.1007/s00429-022-02510-0
Jung, H., Wager, T. D., and Carter, R. M. (2022). Novel cognitive functions arise at the convergence of macroscale gradients. J. Cogn. Neurosci. 34, 381–396. doi: 10.1162/jocn_a_01803
Kim, J. (2023). The effects of time preferences on cooperation: experimental evidence from infinitely repeated games. Am Econ J Microeconomics 15, 618–637. doi: 10.1257/mic.20200195
Kim, J., Lim, W., and Schweighofer-Kodritsch, S. (2023). Patience Is Power: Bargaining and Payoff Delay. Hertie School Working Paper.
Kölle, F., and Laurer, T. (2024). Understanding cooperation in an intertemporal context. Manag. Sci. doi: 10.1287/mnsc.2020.03757
Kölle, F., and Wenner, L. (2023). Is generosity time-inconsistent? Present bias across individual and social contexts. Rev. Econ. Stat. 105, 683–699. doi: 10.1162/rest_a_01049
Kovarik, J. (2009). Giving it now or later: altruism and discounting. Econ. Lett. 102, 152–154. doi: 10.1016/j.econlet.2008.12.005
Lugrin, C., Konovalov, A., and Ruff, C. (2023). Salience-based information aggregation: an overarching function of the “social brain”? bioRxiv . doi: 10.1101/2023.01.30.525877
Peters, J., and Büchel, C. (2010). Episodic future thinking reduces reward delay discounting through an enhancement of prefrontal-mediotemporal interactions. Neuron 66, 138–148. doi: 10.1016/j.neuron.2010.03.026
Pietrzak, M., Yngve, A., Hamilton, P., Kämpe, R., Boehme, R., Asratian, A., et al. (2023). A randomized controlled experimental medicine study of ghrelin in value-based decision making. J. Clin. Invest. 133:e168260. doi: 10.1172/JCI168260
Schacter, D. L., Benoit, R. G., and Szpunar, K. K. (2017). Episodic future thinking: mechanisms and functions. Curr. Opin. Behav. Sci. 17, 41–50. doi: 10.1016/j.cobeha.2017.06.002
Soutschek, A., Ruff, C. C., Strombach, T., Kalenscher, T., and Tobler, P. N. (2016). Brain stimulation reveals crucial role of overcoming self-centeredness in self-control. Sci. Adv. 2:e1600992. doi: 10.1126/sciadv.1600992
Trope, Y., and Liberman, N. (2010). Construal-level theory of psychological distance. Psychol. Rev. 117, 440–463. doi: 10.1037/a0018963
Vieider, F. (2021). Noisy Coding of Time and Reward Discounting. Ghent University Faculty of Economics and Business Administration Working Paper 21/1036. Available at: https://ideas.repec.org/p/rug/rugwps/21-1036.html (Accessed March 29, 2024).
Keywords: prosocial behavior, time, intertemporal, cognitive noise, social brain network
Citation: Persson E, Tinghög G and Västfjäll D (2024) Intertemporal prosocial behavior: a review and research agenda. Front. Psychol . 15:1359447. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1359447
Received: 21 December 2023; Accepted: 25 March 2024; Published: 08 April 2024.
Reviewed by:
Copyright © 2024 Persson, Tinghög and Västfjäll. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY) . The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
*Correspondence: Emil Persson, [email protected]
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.
- Open access
- Published: 24 April 2024
Breast cancer screening motivation and behaviours of women aged over 75 years: a scoping review
- Virginia Dickson-Swift 1 ,
- Joanne Adams 1 ,
- Evelien Spelten 1 ,
- Irene Blackberry 2 ,
- Carlene Wilson 3 , 4 , 5 &
- Eva Yuen 3 , 6 , 7 , 8
BMC Women's Health volume 24 , Article number: 256 ( 2024 ) Cite this article
Metrics details
This scoping review aimed to identify and present the evidence describing key motivations for breast cancer screening among women aged ≥ 75 years. Few of the internationally available guidelines recommend continued biennial screening for this age group. Some suggest ongoing screening is unnecessary or should be determined on individual health status and life expectancy. Recent research has shown that despite recommendations regarding screening, older women continue to hold positive attitudes to breast screening and participate when the opportunity is available.
All original research articles that address motivation, intention and/or participation in screening for breast cancer among women aged ≥ 75 years were considered for inclusion. These included articles reporting on women who use public and private breast cancer screening services and those who do not use screening services (i.e., non-screeners).
The Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) methodology for scoping reviews was used to guide this review. A comprehensive search strategy was developed with the assistance of a specialist librarian to access selected databases including: the Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL), Medline, Web of Science and PsychInfo. The review was restricted to original research studies published since 2009, available in English and focusing on high-income countries (as defined by the World Bank). Title and abstract screening, followed by an assessment of full-text studies against the inclusion criteria was completed by at least two reviewers. Data relating to key motivations, screening intention and behaviour were extracted, and a thematic analysis of study findings undertaken.
A total of fourteen (14) studies were included in the review. Thematic analysis resulted in identification of three themes from included studies highlighting that decisions about screening were influenced by: knowledge of the benefits and harms of screening and their relationship to age; underlying attitudes to the importance of cancer screening in women's lives; and use of decision aids to improve knowledge and guide decision-making.
The results of this review provide a comprehensive overview of current knowledge regarding the motivations and screening behaviour of older women about breast cancer screening which may inform policy development.
Peer Review reports
Introduction
Breast cancer is now the most commonly diagnosed cancer in the world overtaking lung cancer in 2021 [ 1 ]. Across the globe, breast cancer contributed to 25.8% of the total number of new cases of cancer diagnosed in 2020 [ 2 ] and accounts for a high disease burden for women [ 3 ]. Screening for breast cancer is an effective means of detecting early-stage cancer and has been shown to significantly improve survival rates [ 4 ]. A recent systematic review of international screening guidelines found that most countries recommend that women have biennial mammograms between the ages of 40–70 years [ 5 ] with some recommending that there should be no upper age limit [ 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 ] and others suggesting that benefits of continued screening for women over 75 are not clear [ 13 , 14 , 15 ].
Some guidelines suggest that the decision to end screening should be determined based on the individual health status of the woman, their life expectancy and current health issues [ 5 , 16 , 17 ]. This is because the benefits of mammography screening may be limited after 7 years due to existing comorbidities and limited life expectancy [ 18 , 19 , 20 , 21 ], with some jurisdictions recommending breast cancer screening for women ≥ 75 years only when life expectancy is estimated as at least 7–10 years [ 22 ]. Others have argued that decisions about continuing with screening mammography should depend on individual patient risk and health management preferences [ 23 ]. This decision is likely facilitated by a discussion between a health care provider and patient about the harms and benefits of screening outside the recommended ages [ 24 , 25 ]. While mammography may enable early detection of breast cancer, it is clear that false-positive results and overdiagnosis Footnote 1 may occur. Studies have estimated that up to 25% of breast cancer cases in the general population may be over diagnosed [ 26 , 27 , 28 ].
The risk of being diagnosed with breast cancer increases with age and approximately 80% of new cases of breast cancer in high-income countries are in women over the age of 50 [ 29 ]. The average age of first diagnosis of breast cancer in high income countries is comparable to that of Australian women which is now 61 years [ 2 , 4 , 29 ]. Studies show that women aged ≥ 75 years generally have positive attitudes to mammography screening and report high levels of perceived benefits including early detection of breast cancer and a desire to stay healthy as they age [ 21 , 30 , 31 , 32 ]. Some women aged over 74 participate, or plan to participate, in screening despite recommendations from health professionals and government guidelines advising against it [ 33 ]. Results of a recent review found that knowledge of the recommended guidelines and the potential harms of screening are limited and many older women believed that the benefits of continued screening outweighed the risks [ 30 ].
Very few studies have been undertaken to understand the motivations of women to screen or to establish screening participation rates among women aged ≥ 75 and older. This is surprising given that increasing age is recognised as a key risk factor for the development of breast cancer, and that screening is offered in many locations around the world every two years up until 74 years. The importance of this topic is high given the ambiguity around best practice for participation beyond 74 years. A preliminary search of Open Science Framework, PROSPERO, Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews and JBI Evidence Synthesis in May 2022 did not locate any reviews on this topic.
This scoping review has allowed for the mapping of a broad range of research to explore the breadth and depth of the literature, summarize the evidence and identify knowledge gaps [ 34 , 35 ]. This information has supported the development of a comprehensive overview of current knowledge of motivations of women to screen and screening participation rates among women outside the targeted age of many international screening programs.
Materials and methods
Research question.
The research question for this scoping review was developed by applying the Population—Concept—Context (PCC) framework [ 36 ]. The current review addresses the research question “What research has been undertaken in high-income countries (context) exploring the key motivations to screen for breast cancer and screening participation (concepts) among women ≥ 75 years of age (population)?
Eligibility criteria
Participants.
Women aged ≥ 75 years were the key population. Specifically, motivations to screen and screening intention and behaviour and the variables that discriminate those who screen from those who do not (non-screeners) were utilised as the key predictors and outcomes respectively.
From a conceptual perspective it was considered that motivation led to behaviour, therefore articles that described motivation and corresponding behaviour were considered. These included articles reporting on women who use public (government funded) and private (fee for service) breast cancer screening services and those who do not use screening services (i.e., non-screeners).
The scope included high-income countries using the World Bank definition [ 37 ]. These countries have broadly similar health systems and opportunities for breast cancer screening in both public and private settings.
Types of sources
All studies reporting original research in peer-reviewed journals from January 2009 were eligible for inclusion, regardless of design. This date was selected due to an evaluation undertaken for BreastScreen Australia recommending expansion of the age group to include 70–74-year-old women [ 38 ]. This date was also indicative of international debate regarding breast cancer screening effectiveness at this time [ 39 , 40 ]. Reviews were also included, regardless of type—scoping, systematic, or narrative. Only sources published in English and available through the University’s extensive research holdings were eligible for inclusion. Ineligible materials were conference abstracts, letters to the editor, editorials, opinion pieces, commentaries, newspaper articles, dissertations and theses.
This scoping review was registered with the Open Science Framework database ( https://osf.io/fd3eh ) and followed Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) methodology for scoping reviews [ 35 , 36 ]. Although ethics approval is not required for scoping reviews the broader study was approved by the University Ethics Committee (approval number HEC 21249).
Search strategy
A pilot search strategy was developed in consultation with an expert health librarian and tested in MEDLINE (OVID) and conducted on 3 June 2022. Articles from this pilot search were compared with seminal articles previously identified by the members of the team and used to refine the search terms. The search terms were then searched as both keywords and subject headings (e.g., MeSH) in the titles and abstracts and Boolean operators employed. A full MEDLINE search was then carried out by the librarian (see Table 1 ). This search strategy was adapted for use in each of the following databases: Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL), Medical Literature Analysis and Retrieval System Online (MEDLINE), Web of Science and PsychInfo databases. The references of included studies have been hand-searched to identify any additional evidence sources.
Study/source of evidence selection
Following the search, all identified citations were collated and uploaded into EndNote v.X20 (Clarivate Analytics, PA, USA) and duplicates removed. The resulting articles were then imported into Covidence – Cochrane’s systematic review management software [ 41 ]. Duplicates were removed once importation was complete, and title and abstract screening was undertaken against the eligibility criteria. A sample of 25 articles were assessed by all reviewers to ensure reliability in the application of the inclusion and exclusion criteria. Team discussion was used to ensure consistent application. The Covidence software supports blind reviewing with two reviewers required at each screening phase. Potentially relevant sources were retrieved in full text and were assessed against the inclusion criteria by two independent reviewers. Conflicts were flagged within the software which allows the team to discuss those that have disagreements until a consensus was reached. Reasons for exclusion of studies at full text were recorded and reported in the scoping review. The Preferred Reporting Items of Systematic Reviews extension for scoping reviews (PRISMA-ScR) checklist was used to guide the reporting of the review [ 42 ] and all stages were documented using the PRISMA-ScR flow chart [ 42 ].
Data extraction
A data extraction form was created in Covidence and used to extract study characteristics and to confirm the study’s relevance. This included specific details such as article author/s, title, year of publication, country, aim, population, setting, data collection methods and key findings relevant to the review question. The draft extraction form was modified as needed during the data extraction process.
Data analysis and presentation
Extracted data were summarised in tabular format (see Table 2 ). Consistent with the guidelines for the effective reporting of scoping reviews [ 43 ] and the JBI framework [ 35 ] the final stage of the review included thematic analysis of the key findings of the included studies. Study findings were imported into QSR NVivo with coding of each line of text. Descriptive codes reflected key aspects of the included studies related to the motivations and behaviours of women > 75 years about breast cancer screening.
In line with the reporting requirements for scoping reviews the search results for this review are presented in Fig. 1 [ 44 ].
PRISMA Flowchart. From: Page MJ, McKenzie JE, Bossuyt PM, Boutron I, Hoffmann TC, Mulrow CD, et al. The PRISMA 2020 statement: an updated guideline for reporting systematic reviews. BMJ 2021;372:n71. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.n71
A total of fourteen [ 14 ] studies were included in the review with studies from the following countries, US n = 12 [ 33 , 45 , 46 , 47 , 48 , 49 , 50 , 51 , 52 , 53 , 54 , 55 ], UK n = 1 [ 23 ] and France n = 1 [ 56 ]. Sample sizes varied, with most containing fewer than 50 women ( n = 8) [ 33 , 45 , 46 , 48 , 51 , 52 , 55 ]. Two had larger samples including a French study with 136 women (a sub-set of a larger sample) [ 56 ], and one mixed method study in the UK with a sample of 26 women undertaking interviews and 479 women completing surveys [ 23 ]. One study did not report exact numbers [ 50 ]. Three studies [ 47 , 53 , 54 ] were undertaken by a group of researchers based in the US utilising the same sample of women, however each of the papers focused on different primary outcomes. The samples in the included studies were recruited from a range of locations including primary medical care clinics, specialist medical clinics, University affiliated medical clinics, community-based health centres and community outreach clinics [ 47 , 53 , 54 ].
Data collection methods varied and included: quantitative ( n = 8), qualitative ( n = 5) and mixed methods ( n = 1). A range of data collection tools and research designs were utilised; pre/post, pilot and cross-sectional surveys, interviews, and secondary analysis of existing data sets. Seven studies focused on the use of a Decision Aids (DAs), either in original or modified form, developed by Schonberg et al. [ 55 ] as a tool to increase knowledge about the harms and benefits of screening for older women [ 45 , 47 , 48 , 49 , 52 , 54 , 55 ]. Three studies focused on intention to screen [ 33 , 53 , 56 ], two on knowledge of, and attitudes to, screening [ 23 , 46 ], one on information needs relating to risks and benefits of screening discontinuation [ 51 ], and one on perceptions about discontinuation of screening and impact of social interactions on screening [ 50 ].
The three themes developed from the analysis of the included studies highlighted that decisions about screening were primarily influenced by: (1) knowledge of the benefits and harms of screening and their relationship to age; (2) underlying attitudes to the importance of cancer screening in women's lives; and (3) exposure to decision aids designed to facilitate informed decision-making. Each of these themes will be presented below drawing on the key findings of the appropriate studies. The full dataset of extracted data can be found in Table 2 .
Knowledge of the benefits and harms of screening ≥ 75 years
The decision to participate in routine mammography is influenced by individual differences in cognition and affect, interpersonal relationships, provider characteristics, and healthcare system variables. Women typically perceive mammograms as a positive, beneficial and routine component of care [ 46 ] and an important aspect of taking care of themselves [ 23 , 46 , 49 ]. One qualitative study undertaken in the US showed that few women had discussed mammography cessation or the potential harms of screening with their health care providers and some women reported they would insist on receiving mammography even without a provider recommendation to continue screening [ 46 ].
Studies suggested that ageing itself, and even poor health, were not seen as reasonable reasons for screening cessation. For many women, guidance from a health care provider was deemed the most important influence on decision-making [ 46 ]. Preferences for communication about risk and benefits were varied with one study reporting women would like to learn more about harms and risks and recommended that this information be communicated via physicians or other healthcare providers, included in brochures/pamphlets, and presented outside of clinical settings (e.g., in community-based seniors groups) [ 51 ]. Others reported that women were sometimes sceptical of expert and government recommendations [ 33 ] although some were happy to participate in discussions with health educators or care providers about breast cancer screening harms and benefits and potential cessation [ 52 ].
Underlying attitudes to the importance of cancer screening at and beyond 75 years
Included studies varied in describing the importance of screening, with some attitudes based on past attendance and some based on future intentions to screen. Three studies reported findings indicating that some women intended to continue screening after 75 years of age [ 23 , 45 , 46 ], with one study in the UK reporting that women supported an extension of the automatic recall indefinitely, regardless of age or health status. In this study, failure to invite older women to screen was interpreted as age discrimination [ 23 ]. The desire to continue screening beyond 75 was also highlighted in a study from France that found that 60% of the women ( n = 136 aged ≥ 75) intended to pursue screening in the future, and 27 women aged ≥ 75, who had never undergone mammography previously (36%), intended to do so in the future [ 56 ]. In this same study, intentions to screen varied significantly [ 56 ]. There were no sociodemographic differences observed between screened and unscreened women with regard to level of education, income, health risk behaviour (smoking, alcohol consumption), knowledge about the importance and the process of screening, or psychological features (fear of the test, fear of the results, fear of the disease, trust in screening impact) [ 56 ]. Further analysis showed that three items were statistically correlated with a higher rate of attendance at screening: (1) screening was initiated by a physician; (2) the women had a consultation with a gynaecologist during the past 12 months; and (3) the women had already undergone at least five screening mammograms. Analysis highlighted that although average income, level of education, psychological features or other types of health risk behaviours did not impact screening intention, having a mammogram previously impacted likelihood of ongoing screening. There was no information provided that explained why women who had not previously undergone screening might do so in the future.
A mixed methods study in the UK reported similar findings [ 23 ]. Utilising interviews ( n = 26) and questionnaires ( n = 479) with women ≥ 70 years (median age 75 years) the overwhelming result (90.1%) was that breast screening should be offered to all women indefinitely regardless of age, health status or fitness [ 23 ], and that many older women were keen to continue screening. Both the interview and survey data confirmed women were uncertain about eligibility for breast screening. The survey data showed that just over half the women (52.9%) were unaware that they could request mammography or knew how to access it. Key reasons for screening discontinuation were not being invited for screening (52.1%) and not knowing about self-referral (35.1%).
Women reported that not being invited to continue screening sent messages that screening was no longer important or required for this age group [ 23 ]. Almost two thirds of the women completing the survey (61.6%) said they would forget to attend screening without an invitation. Other reasons for screening discontinuation included transport difficulties (25%) and not wishing to burden family members (24.7%). By contrast, other studies have reported that women do not endorse discontinuation of screening mammography due to advancing age or poor health, but some may be receptive to reducing screening frequency on recommendation from their health care provider [ 46 , 51 ].
Use of Decision Aids (DAs) to improve knowledge and guide screening decision-making
Many women reported poor knowledge about the harms and benefits of screening with studies identifying an important role for DAs. These aids have been shown to be effective in improving knowledge of the harms and benefits of screening [ 45 , 54 , 55 ] including for women with low educational attainment; as compared to women with high educational attainment [ 47 ]. DAs can increase knowledge about screening [ 47 , 49 ] and may decrease the intention to continue screening after the recommended age [ 45 , 52 , 54 ]. They can be used by primary care providers to support a conversation about breast screening intention and reasons for discontinuing screening. In one pilot study undertaken in the US using a DA, 5 of the 8 women (62.5%) indicated they intended to continue to receive mammography; however, 3 participants planned to get them less often [ 45 ]. When asked whether they thought their physician would want them to get a mammogram, 80% said “yes” on pre-test; this figure decreased to 62.5% after exposure to the DA. This pilot study suggests that the use of a decision-aid may result in fewer women ≥ 75 years old continuing to screen for breast cancer [ 45 ].
Similar findings were evident in two studies drawing on the same data undertaken in the US [ 48 , 53 ]. Using a larger sample ( n = 283), women’s intentions to screen prior to a visit with their primary care provider and then again after exposure to the DA were compared. Results showed that 21.7% of women reduced their intention to be screened, 7.9% increased their intentions to be screened, and 70.4% did not change. Compared to those who had no change or increased their screening intentions, women who had a decrease in screening intention were significantly less likely to receive screening after 18 months. Generally, studies have shown that women aged 75 and older find DAs acceptable and helpful [ 47 , 48 , 49 , 55 ] and using them had the potential to impact on a women’s intention to screen [ 55 ].
Cadet and colleagues [ 49 ] explored the impact of educational attainment on the use of DAs. Results highlight that education moderates the utility of these aids; women with lower educational attainment were less likely to understand all the DA’s content (46.3% vs 67.5%; P < 0.001); had less knowledge of the benefits and harms of mammography (adjusted mean ± standard error knowledge score, 7.1 ± 0.3 vs 8.1 ± 0.3; p < 0.001); and were less likely to have their screening intentions impacted (adjusted percentage, 11.4% vs 19.4%; p = 0.01).
This scoping review summarises current knowledge regarding motivations and screening behaviours of women over 75 years. The findings suggest that awareness of the importance of breast cancer screening among women aged ≥ 75 years is high [ 23 , 46 , 49 ] and that many women wish to continue screening regardless of perceived health status or age. This highlights the importance of focusing on motivation and screening behaviours and the multiple factors that influence ongoing participation in breast screening programs.
The generally high regard attributed to screening among women aged ≥ 75 years presents a complex challenge for health professionals who are focused on potential harm (from available national and international guidelines) in ongoing screening for women beyond age 75 [ 18 , 20 , 57 ]. Included studies highlight that many women relied on the advice of health care providers regarding the benefits and harms when making the decision to continue breast screening [ 46 , 51 , 52 ], however there were some that did not [ 33 ]. Having a previous pattern of screening was noted as being more significant to ongoing intention than any other identified socio-demographic feature [ 56 ]. This is perhaps because women will not readily forgo health care practices that they have always considered important and that retain ongoing importance for the broader population.
For those women who had discontinued screening after the age of 74 it was apparent that the rationale for doing so was not often based on choice or receipt of information, but rather on factors that impact decision-making in relation to screening. These included no longer receiving an invitation to attend, transport difficulties and not wanting to be a burden on relatives or friends [ 23 , 46 , 51 ]. Ongoing receipt of invitations to screen was an important aspect of maintaining a capacity to choose [ 23 ]. This was particularly important for those women who had been regular screeners.
Women over 75 require more information to make decisions regarding screening [ 23 , 52 , 54 , 55 ], however health care providers must also be aware that the element of choice is important for older women. Having a capacity to choose avoids any notion of discrimination based on age, health status, gender or sociodemographic difference and acknowledges the importance of women retaining control over their health [ 23 ]. It was apparent that some women would choose to continue screening at a reduced frequency if this option was available and that women should have access to information facilitating self-referral [ 23 , 45 , 46 , 51 , 56 ].
Decision-making regarding ongoing breast cancer screening has been facilitated via the use of Decision Aids (DAs) within clinical settings [ 54 , 55 ]. While some studies suggest that women will make a decision regardless of health status, the use of DAs has impacted women’s decision to screen. While this may have limited benefit for those of lower educational attainment [ 48 ] they have been effective in improving knowledge relating to harms and benefits of screening particularly where they have been used to support a conversation with women about the value of screening [ 54 , 55 , 56 ].
Women have identified challenges in engaging in conversations with health care providers regarding ongoing screening, because providers frequently draw on projections of life expectancy and over-diagnosis [ 17 , 51 ]. As a result, these conversations about screening after age 75 years often do not occur [ 46 ]. It is likely that health providers may need more support and guidance in leading these conversations. This may be through the use of DAs or standardised checklists. It may be possible to incorporate these within existing health preventive measures for this age group. The potential for advice regarding ongoing breast cancer screening to be available outside of clinical settings may provide important pathways for conversations with women regarding health choices. Provision of information and advice in settings such as community based seniors groups [ 51 ] offers a potential platform to broaden conversations and align sources of information, not only with health professionals but amongst women themselves. This may help to address any misconception regarding eligibility and access to services [ 23 ]. It may also be aligned with other health promotion and lifestyle messages provided to this age group.
Limitations of the review
The searches that formed the basis of this review were carried in June 2022. Although the search was comprehensive, we have only captured those studies that were published in the included databases from 2009. There may have been other studies published outside of these periods. We also limited the search to studies published in English with full-text availability.
The emphasis of a scoping review is on comprehensive coverage and synthesis of the key findings, rather than on a particular standard of evidence and, consequently a quality assessment of the included studies was not undertaken. This has resulted in the inclusion of a wide range of study designs and data collection methods. It is important to note that three studies included in the review drew on the same sample of women (283 over > 75)[ 49 , 53 , 54 ]. The results of this review provide valuable insights into motivations and behaviours for breast cancer screening for older women, however they should be interpreted with caution given the specific methodological and geographical limitations.
Conclusion and recommendations
This scoping review highlighted a range of key motivations and behaviours in relation to breast cancer screening for women ≥ 75 years of age. The results provide some insight into how decisions about screening continuation after 74 are made and how informed decision-making can be supported. Specifically, this review supports the following suggestions for further research and policy direction:
Further research regarding breast cancer screening motivations and behaviours for women over 75 would provide valuable insight for health providers delivering services to women in this age group.
Health providers may benefit from the broader use of decision aids or structured checklists to guide conversations with women over 75 regarding ongoing health promotion/preventive measures.
Providing health-based information in non-clinical settings frequented by women in this age group may provide a broader reach of information and facilitate choices. This may help to reduce any perception of discrimination based on age, health status or socio-demographic factors.
Availability of data and materials
All data generated or analysed during this study is included in this published article (see Table 2 above).
Cancer Australia, in their 2014 position statement, define “overdiagnosis” in the following way. ‘’Overdiagnosis’ from breast screening does not refer to error or misdiagnosis, but rather refers to breast cancer diagnosed by screening that would not otherwise have been diagnosed during a woman’s lifetime. “Overdiagnosis” includes all instances where cancers detected through screening (ductal carcinoma in situ or invasive breast cancer) might never have progressed to become symptomatic during a woman’s life, i.e., cancer that would not have been detected in the absence of screening. It is not possible to precisely predict at diagnosis, to which cancers overdiagnosis would apply.” (accessed 22. nd August 2022; https://www.canceraustralia.gov.au/resources/position-statements/overdiagnosis-mammographic-screening ).
World Health Organization. Breast Cancer Geneva: WHO; 2021 [Available from: https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/breast-cancer#:~:text=Reducing%20global%20breast%20cancer%20mortality,and%20comprehensive%20breast%20cancer%20management .
International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC). IARC Handbooks on Cancer Screening: Volume 15 Breast Cancer Geneva: IARC; 2016 [Available from: https://publications.iarc.fr/Book-And-Report-Series/Iarc-Handbooks-Of-Cancer-Prevention/Breast-Cancer-Screening-2016 .
Australian Institute of Health and Welfare. Cancer in Australia 2021 [Available from: https://www.canceraustralia.gov.au/cancer-types/breast-cancer/statistics .
Breast Cancer Network Australia. Current breast cancer statistics in Australia 2020 [Available from: https://www.bcna.org.au/media/7111/bcna-2019-current-breast-cancer-statistics-in-australia-11jan2019.pdf .
Ren W, Chen M, Qiao Y, Zhao F. Global guidelines for breast cancer screening: A systematic review. The Breast. 2022;64:85–99.
Article PubMed PubMed Central Google Scholar
Cardoso F, Kyriakides S, Ohno S, Penault-Llorca F, Poortmans P, Rubio IT, et al. Early breast cancer: ESMO Clinical Practice Guidelines for diagnosis, treatment and follow-up. Ann Oncol. 2019;30(8):1194–220.
Article CAS PubMed Google Scholar
Hamashima C, Hattori M, Honjo S, Kasahara Y, Katayama T, Nakai M, et al. The Japanese guidelines for breast cancer screening. Jpn J Clin Oncol. 2016;46(5):482–92.
Article PubMed Google Scholar
Bevers TB, Helvie M, Bonaccio E, Calhoun KE, Daly MB, Farrar WB, et al. Breast cancer screening and diagnosis, version 3.2018, NCCN clinical practice guidelines in oncology. J Natl Compr Canc Net. 2018;16(11):1362–89.
Article Google Scholar
He J, Chen W, Li N, Shen H, Li J, Wang Y, et al. China guideline for the screening and early detection of female breast cancer (2021, Beijing). Zhonghua Zhong liu za zhi [Chinese Journal of Oncology]. 2021;43(4):357–82.
CAS PubMed Google Scholar
Cancer Australia. Early detection of breast cancer 2021 [cited 2022 25 July]. Available from: https://www.canceraustralia.gov.au/resources/position-statements/early-detection-breast-cancer .
Schünemann HJ, Lerda D, Quinn C, Follmann M, Alonso-Coello P, Rossi PG, et al. Breast Cancer Screening and Diagnosis: A Synopsis of the European Breast Guidelines. Ann Intern Med. 2019;172(1):46–56.
World Health Organization. WHO Position Paper on Mammography Screening Geneva WHO. 2016.
Google Scholar
Lansdorp-Vogelaar I, Gulati R, Mariotto AB. Personalizing age of cancer screening cessation based on comorbid conditions: model estimates of harms and benefits. Ann Intern Med. 2014;161:104.
Lee CS, Moy L, Joe BN, Sickles EA, Niell BL. Screening for Breast Cancer in Women Age 75 Years and Older. Am J Roentgenol. 2017;210(2):256–63.
Broeders M, Moss S, Nystrom L. The impact of mammographic screening on breast cancer mortality in Europe: a review of observational studies. J Med Screen. 2012;19(suppl 1):14.
Oeffinger KC, Fontham ETH, Etzioni R, Herzig A, Michaelson JS, Shih YCT, et al. Breast cancer screening for women at average risk: 2015 Guideline update from the American cancer society. JAMA - Journal of the American Medical Association. 2015;314(15):1599–614.
Walter LC, Schonberg MA. Screening mammography in older women: a review. JAMA. 2014;311:1336.
Article CAS PubMed PubMed Central Google Scholar
Braithwaite D, Walter LC, Izano M, Kerlikowske K. Benefits and harms of screening mammography by comorbidity and age: a qualitative synthesis of observational studies and decision analyses. J Gen Intern Med. 2016;31:561.
Braithwaite D, Mandelblatt JS, Kerlikowske K. To screen or not to screen older women for breast cancer: a conundrum. Future Oncol. 2013;9(6):763–6.
Demb J, Abraham L, Miglioretti DL, Sprague BL, O’Meara ES, Advani S, et al. Screening Mammography Outcomes: Risk of Breast Cancer and Mortality by Comorbidity Score and Age. Jnci-Journal of the National Cancer Institute. 2020;112(6):599–606.
Demb J, Akinyemiju T, Allen I, Onega T, Hiatt RA, Braithwaite D. Screening mammography use in older women according to health status: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Clin Interv Aging. 2018;13:1987–97.
Qaseem A, Lin JS, Mustafa RA, Horwitch CA, Wilt TJ. Screening for Breast Cancer in Average-Risk Women: A Guidance Statement From the American College of Physicians. Ann Intern Med. 2019;170(8):547–60.
Collins K, Winslow M, Reed MW, Walters SJ, Robinson T, Madan J, et al. The views of older women towards mammographic screening: a qualitative and quantitative study. Br J Cancer. 2010;102(10):1461–7.
Welch HG, Black WC. Overdiagnosis in cancer. J Natl Cancer Inst. 2010;102(9):605–13.
Hersch J, Jansen J, Barratt A, Irwig L, Houssami N, Howard K, et al. Women’s views on overdiagnosis in breast cancer screening: a qualitative study. BMJ : British Medical Journal. 2013;346:f158.
De Gelder R, Heijnsdijk EAM, Van Ravesteyn NT, Fracheboud J, Draisma G, De Koning HJ. Interpreting overdiagnosis estimates in population-based mammography screening. Epidemiol Rev. 2011;33(1):111–21.
Monticciolo DL, Helvie MA, Edward HR. Current issues in the overdiagnosis and overtreatment of breast cancer. Am J Roentgenol. 2018;210(2):285–91.
Shepardson LB, Dean L. Current controversies in breast cancer screening. Semin Oncol. 2020;47(4):177–81.
National Cancer Control Centre. Cancer incidence in Australia 2022 [Available from: https://ncci.canceraustralia.gov.au/diagnosis/cancer-incidence/cancer-incidence .
Austin JD, Shelton RC, Lee Argov EJ, Tehranifar P. Older Women’s Perspectives Driving Mammography Screening Use and Overuse: a Narrative Review of Mixed-Methods Studies. Current Epidemiology Reports. 2020;7(4):274–89.
Austin JD, Tehranifar P, Rodriguez CB, Brotzman L, Agovino M, Ziazadeh D, et al. A mixed-methods study of multi-level factors influencing mammography overuse among an older ethnically diverse screening population: implications for de-implementation. Implementation Science Communications. 2021;2(1):110.
Demb J, Allen I, Braithwaite D. Utilization of screening mammography in older women according to comorbidity and age: protocol for a systematic review. Syst Rev. 2016;5(1):168.
Housten AJ, Pappadis MR, Krishnan S, Weller SC, Giordano SH, Bevers TB, et al. Resistance to discontinuing breast cancer screening in older women: A qualitative study. Psychooncology. 2018;27(6):1635–41.
Arksey H, O’Malley L. Scoping studies: towards a methodological framework. Int J Soc Res Methodol. 2005;8(1):19–32.
Peters M, Godfrey C, McInerney P, Munn Z, Tricco A, Khalil HAE, et al. Chapter 11: Scoping reviews. JBI Manual for Evidence Synthesis 2020 [Available from: https://jbi-global-wiki.refined.site/space/MANUAL .
Peters MD, Godfrey C, McInerney P, Khalil H, Larsen P, Marnie C, et al. Best practice guidance and reporting items for the development of scoping review protocols. JBI evidence synthesis. 2022;20(4):953–68.
Fantom NJ, Serajuddin U. The World Bank’s classification of countries by income. World Bank Policy Research Working Paper; 2016.
Book Google Scholar
BreastScreen Australia Evaluation Taskforce. BreastScreen Australia Evaluation. Evaluation final report: Screening Monograph No 1/2009. Canberra; Australia Australian Government Department of Health and Ageing; 2009.
Nelson HD, Cantor A, Humphrey L. Screening for breast cancer: a systematic review to update the 2009 U.S. Preventive Services Task Force recommendation2016.
Woolf SH. The 2009 breast cancer screening recommendations of the US Preventive Services Task Force. JAMA. 2010;303(2):162–3.
Covidence systematic review software. [Internet]. Veritas-Health-Innovation 2020. Available from: https://www.covidence.org/ .
Tricco AC, Lillie E, Zarin W, O’Brien KK, Colquhoun H, Levac D, et al. PRISMA Extension for Scoping Reviews (PRISMA-ScR): Checklist and Explanation. Ann Intern Med. 2018;169(7):467–73.
Tricco AC, Lillie E, Zarin W, O’Brien K, Colquhoun H, Kastner M, et al. A scoping review on the conduct and reporting of scoping reviews. BMC Med Res Methodol. 2016;16(1):15.
Page MJ, McKenzie JE, Bossuyt PM, Boutron I, Hoffmann TC, Mulrow CD, et al. The PRISMA 2020 statement: an updated guideline for reporting systematic reviews. BMJ. 2021;372:n71.
Beckmeyer A, Smith RM, Miles L, Schonberg MA, Toland AE, Hirsch H. Pilot Evaluation of Patient-centered Survey Tools for Breast Cancer Screening Decision-making in Women 75 and Older. Health Behavior and Policy Review. 2020;7(1):13–8.
Brotzman LE, Shelton RC, Austin JD, Rodriguez CB, Agovino M, Moise N, et al. “It’s something I’ll do until I die”: A qualitative examination into why older women in the U.S. continue screening mammography. Canc Med. 2022;11(20):3854–62.
Article CAS Google Scholar
Cadet T, Pinheiro A, Karamourtopoulos M, Jacobson AR, Aliberti GM, Kistler CE, et al. Effects by educational attainment of a mammography screening patient decision aid for women aged 75 years and older. Cancer. 2021;127(23):4455–63.
Cadet T, Aliberti G, Karamourtopoulos M, Jacobson A, Gilliam EA, Primeau S, et al. Evaluation of a mammography decision aid for women 75 and older at risk for lower health literacy in a pretest-posttest trial. Patient Educ Couns. 2021;104(9):2344–50.
Cadet T, Aliberti G, Karamourtopoulos M, Jacobson A, Siska M, Schonberg MA. Modifying a mammography decision aid for older adult women with risk factors for low health literacy. Health Lit Res Prac. 2021;5(2):e78–90.
Gray N, Picone G. Evidence of Large-Scale Social Interactions in Mammography in the United States. Atl Econ J. 2018;46(4):441–57.
Hoover DS, Pappadis MR, Housten AJ, Krishnan S, Weller SC, Giordano SH, et al. Preferences for Communicating about Breast Cancer Screening Among Racially/Ethnically Diverse Older Women. Health Commun. 2019;34(7):702–6.
Salzman B, Bistline A, Cunningham A, Silverio A, Sifri R. Breast Cancer Screening Shared Decision-Making in Older African-American Women. J Natl Med Assoc. 2020;112(5):556–60.
PubMed Google Scholar
Schoenborn NL, Pinheiro A, Kistler CE, Schonberg MA. Association between Breast Cancer Screening Intention and Behavior in the Context of Screening Cessation in Older Women. Med Decis Making. 2021;41(2):240–4.
Schonberg MA, Kistler CE, Pinheiro A, Jacobson AR, Aliberti GM, Karamourtopoulos M, et al. Effect of a Mammography Screening Decision Aid for Women 75 Years and Older: A Cluster Randomized Clinical Trial. JAMA Intern Med. 2020;180(6):831–42.
Schonberg MA, Hamel MB, Davis RB. Development and evaluation of a decision aid on mammography screening for women 75 years and older. JAMA Intern Med. 2014;174:417.
Eisinger F, Viguier J, Blay J-Y, Morère J-F, Coscas Y, Roussel C, et al. Uptake of breast cancer screening in women aged over 75years: a controversy to come? Eur J Cancer Prev. 2011;20(Suppl 1):S13-5.
Schonberg MA, Breslau ES, McCarthy EP. Targeting of Mammography Screening According to Life Expectancy in Women Aged 75 and Older. J Am Geriatr Soc. 2013;61(3):388–95.
Download references
Acknowledgements
We would like to acknowledge Ange Hayden-Johns (expert librarian) who assisted with the development of the search criteria and undertook the relevant searches and Tejashree Kangutkar who assisted with some of the Covidence work.
This work was supported by funding from the Australian Government Department of Health and Aged Care (ID: Health/20–21/E21-10463).
Author information
Authors and affiliations.
Violet Vines Centre for Rural Health Research, La Trobe Rural Health School, La Trobe University, P.O. Box 199, Bendigo, VIC, 3552, Australia
Virginia Dickson-Swift, Joanne Adams & Evelien Spelten
Care Economy Research Institute, La Trobe University, Wodonga, Australia
Irene Blackberry
Olivia Newton-John Cancer Wellness and Research Centre, Austin Health, Melbourne, Australia
Carlene Wilson & Eva Yuen
Melbourne School of Population and Global Health, Melbourne University, Melbourne, Australia
Carlene Wilson
School of Psychology and Public Health, La Trobe University, Bundoora, Australia
Institute for Health Transformation, Deakin University, Burwood, Australia
Centre for Quality and Patient Safety, Monash Health Partnership, Monash Health, Clayton, Australia
You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar
Contributions
VDS conceived and designed the scoping review. VDS & JA developed the search strategy with librarian support, and all authors (VDS, JA, ES, IB, CW, EY) participated in the screening and data extraction stages and assisted with writing the review. All authors provided editorial support and read and approved the final manuscript prior to submission.
Corresponding author
Correspondence to Joanne Adams .
Ethics declarations
Competing interests.
The authors declare no competing interests.
Ethics approval and consent to participate
Ethics approval and consent to participate was not required for this study.
Consent for publication
Consent for publication was not required for this study.
Competing interest
The authors declare they have no competing interests.
Additional information
Publisher’s note.
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Rights and permissions
Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ . The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver ( http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/ ) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data.
Reprints and permissions
About this article
Cite this article.
Dickson-Swift, V., Adams, J., Spelten, E. et al. Breast cancer screening motivation and behaviours of women aged over 75 years: a scoping review. BMC Women's Health 24 , 256 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12905-024-03094-z
Download citation
Received : 06 September 2023
Accepted : 15 April 2024
Published : 24 April 2024
DOI : https://doi.org/10.1186/s12905-024-03094-z
Share this article
Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:
Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.
Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative
- Breast cancer
- Mammography
- Older women
- Scoping review
BMC Women's Health
ISSN: 1472-6874
- Submission enquiries: [email protected]
- General enquiries: [email protected]
Evidence Review of the Adverse Effects of COVID-19 Vaccination and Intramuscular Vaccine Administration
Vaccines are a public health success story, as they have prevented or lessened the effects of many infectious diseases. To address concerns around potential vaccine injuries, the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) administers the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program (VICP) and the Countermeasures Injury Compensation Program (CICP), which provide compensation to those who assert that they were injured by routine vaccines or medical countermeasures, respectively. The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine have contributed to the scientific basis for VICP compensation decisions for decades.
HRSA asked the National Academies to convene an expert committee to review the epidemiological, clinical, and biological evidence about the relationship between COVID-19 vaccines and specific adverse events, as well as intramuscular administration of vaccines and shoulder injuries. This report outlines the committee findings and conclusions.
Read Full Description
- Digital Resource: Evidence Review of the Adverse Effects of COVID-19 Vaccination
- Digital Resource: Evidence Review of Shoulder Injuries from Intramuscular Administration of Vaccines
- Press Release
Recent News
The Challenge of Predicting Climate Migration
Celebrating Earth Day with the National Academies
Rohr Named U.S. Winner of Frontiers Planet Prize
NAS Launches Science and Innovation Fund for Ukraine
- Load More...
- SUGGESTED TOPICS
- The Magazine
- Newsletters
- Managing Yourself
- Managing Teams
- Work-life Balance
- The Big Idea
- Data & Visuals
- Reading Lists
- Case Selections
- HBR Learning
- Topic Feeds
- Account Settings
- Email Preferences
The Research-Backed Benefits of Daily Rituals
- Michael I. Norton
A survey of more than 130 HBR readers asked how they use rituals to start their days, psych themselves up for stressful challenges, and transition when the workday is done.
While some may cringe at forced corporate rituals, research shows that personal and team rituals can actually benefit the way we work. The authors’ expertise on the topic over the past decade, plus a survey of nearly 140 HBR readers, explores the ways rituals can set us up for success before work, get us psyched up for important presentations, foster a strong team culture, and help us wind down at the end of the day.
“Give me a W ! Give me an A ! Give me an L ! Give me a squiggly! Give me an M ! Give me an A ! Give me an R ! Give me a T !”
- Michael I. Norton is the Harold M. Brierley Professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Business School. He is the author of The Ritual Effect and co-author of Happy Money: The Science of Happier Spending . His research focuses on happiness, well-being, rituals, and inequality. See his faculty page here .
IMAGES
VIDEO
COMMENTS
Creation of new body of knowledge. One of the key advantages of literature review is that it creates new body of knowledge. Through careful evaluation and critical summarisation, researchers can create a new body of knowledge and enrich the field of study. Answers to a range of questions. Literature reviews help researchers analyse the existing ...
Upon completion of the literature review, a researcher should have a solid foundation of knowledge in the area and a good feel for the direction any new research should take. Should any additional questions arise during the course of the research, the researcher will know which experts to consult in order to quickly clear up those questions.
As mentioned previously, there are a number of existing guidelines for literature reviews. Depending on the methodology needed to achieve the purpose of the review, all types can be helpful and appropriate to reach a specific goal (for examples, please see Table 1).These approaches can be qualitative, quantitative, or have a mixed design depending on the phase of the review.
Examples of literature reviews. Step 1 - Search for relevant literature. Step 2 - Evaluate and select sources. Step 3 - Identify themes, debates, and gaps. Step 4 - Outline your literature review's structure. Step 5 - Write your literature review.
Mapping the gap. The purpose of the literature review section of a manuscript is not to report what is known about your topic. The purpose is to identify what remains unknown—what academic writing scholar Janet Giltrow has called the 'knowledge deficit'—thus establishing the need for your research study [].In an earlier Writer's Craft instalment, the Problem-Gap-Hook heuristic was ...
Literature search. Fink has defined research literature review as a "systematic, explicit and reproducible method for identifying, evaluating, and synthesizing the existing body of completed and recorded work produced by researchers, scholars and practitioners."[]Review of research literature can be summarized into a seven step process: (i) Selecting research questions/purpose of the ...
Example: Predictors and Outcomes of U.S. Quality Maternity Leave: A Review and Conceptual Framework: 10.1177/08948453211037398 ; Systematic review: "The authors of a systematic review use a specific procedure to search the research literature, select the studies to include in their review, and critically evaluate the studies they find." (p. 139).
A sophisticated literature review (LR) can result in a robust dissertation/thesis by scrutinizing the main problem examined by the academic study; anticipating research hypotheses, methods and results; and maintaining the interest of the audience in how the dissertation/thesis will provide solutions for the current gaps in a particular field.
Besides the obvious reason for students -- because it is assigned! -- a literature review helps you explore the research that has come before you, to see how your research question has (or has not) already been addressed. You identify: core research in the field. experts in the subject area. methodology you may want to use (or avoid)
Most literature reviews are embedded in articles, books, and dissertations. In most research articles, there are set as a specific section, usually titled, "literature review", so they are hard to miss.But, sometimes, they are part of the narrative of the introduction of a book or article. This section is easily recognized since the author is engaging with other academics and experts by ...
Writing an interdisciplinary literature review involves searching for possible points of overlap, identifying multiple different gaps, and unifying separate sets of ideas. The complexities of interdisciplinary research become more apparent the greater the distance between fields. Researchers are likely to find more similarities among literature ...
What is a literature review? Definition: A literature review is a systematic examination and synthesis of existing scholarly research on a specific topic or subject. Purpose: It serves to provide a comprehensive overview of the current state of knowledge within a particular field. Analysis: Involves critically evaluating and summarizing key findings, methodologies, and debates found in ...
A formal literature review is an evidence-based, in-depth analysis of a subject. There are many reasons for writing one and these will influence the length and style of your review, but in essence a literature review is a critical appraisal of the current collective knowledge on a subject. Rather than just being an exhaustive list of all that ...
A literature review is meant to analyze the scholarly literature, make connections across writings and identify strengths, weaknesses, trends, and missing conversations. A literature review should address different aspects of a topic as it relates to your research question. A literature review goes beyond a description or summary of the ...
The systematic review is a method, which is the main aim to synthesize and summarize the results of studies on the same research area. Systematic reviews have some differences from literature reviews in some aspects. The most distinct difference is systematic reviews involve a detailed and well-defined plan with a search strategy (Uman, 2011 ).
A literature review is an in-depth critical analysis of published scholarly research related to a specific topic.Published scholarly research (the "literature") may include journal articles, books, book chapters, dissertations and thesis, or conference proceedings. A solid lit review must:
Doing a literature review is an integral part of research and yet it can be a daunting process. In this chapter, I will give you practical guidelines on how to conduct an effective literature review. Overall, the process can be divided into five main steps: 1.
A literature review serves two main purposes: 1) To show awareness of the present state of knowledge in a particular field, including: seminal authors. the main empirical research. theoretical positions. controversies. breakthroughs as well as links to other related areas of knowledge. 2) To provide a foundation for the author's research.
Literature review is an essential feature of academic research. Fundamentally, knowledge advancement must be built on prior existing work. To push the knowledge frontier, we must know where the frontier is. By reviewing relevant literature, we understand the breadth and depth of the existing body of work and identify gaps to explore.
A literature review is important because it: Explains the background of research on a topic. Demonstrates why a topic is significant to a subject area. Discovers relationships between research studies/ideas. Identifies major themes, concepts, and researchers on a topic. Identifies critical gaps and points of disagreement.
Below are few benefits of Literature review to researchers: A thorough exploration of the literature review will help to articulate our own research problems, objectives, as well as formulating our research questions or hypothesis. It helps to know the existing GAPS. It helps to notices the important concepts and variables and how they were ...
6. Incorporate the literature review into your research paper draft. (note: this step is only if you are using the literature review to write a research paper. Many times the literature review is an end unto itself). After the literature review is complete, you should incorporate it into your research paper (if you are writing the review as one ...
Purpose and Importance of the Literature Review. An understanding of the current literature is critical for all phases of a research study. Lingard 9 recently invoked the "journal-as-conversation" metaphor as a way of understanding how one's research fits into the larger medical education conversation. As she described it: "Imagine yourself joining a conversation at a social event.
Here, we review this emerging literature on intertemporal prosocial decision-making and discuss several promising directions for new research. 2 Emerging literature on intertemporal prosocial decision-making. The core research strategy for most papers in this emerging field has been to add a time delay to a standard prosocial decision-context ...
This scoping review has allowed for the mapping of a broad range of research to explore the breadth and depth of the literature, summarize the evidence and identify knowledge gaps [34, 35]. This information has supported the development of a comprehensive overview of current knowledge of motivations of women to screen and screening ...
WASHINGTON — A new report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine reviews evidence for 19 potential harms of the COVID-19 vaccines, and for nine potential shoulder injuries from intramuscular administration of vaccines more broadly. The committee that conducted the review identified sufficient evidence to draw 20 conclusions about whether these vaccines could cause ...
ABSTRACT. To evaluate whether patients with multiple myeloma (MM) could benefit from tandem autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (auto-HSCT), PubMed, Embase, Web of Science and Cochrane Library databases were systematically searched, and 10 eligible studies were included after data extraction and quality evaluation.
Yaroslav Danylchenko/Stocksy. Summary. Novartis has trained more than 1,000 employees as Mental Health First Aiders to offer peer-to-peer support for their colleagues. While employees were eager ...
The Research-Backed Benefits of Daily Rituals. by. Michael I. Norton. April 10, 2024. mrs/Getty Images. Save. Summary. While some may cringe at forced corporate rituals, research shows that ...
The study of the effects of aging on neural activity in the human brain has attracted considerable attention in neurophysiological, neuropsychiatric, and neurocognitive research, as it is directly linked to an understanding of the neural mechanisms underlying the disruption of the brain structures and functions that lead to age-related pathological disorders. Electroencephalographic (EEG ...