Literature Review
-The preferred format for this review of literature is about ten pages in length, typed, and double spaced.
-Please use American Psychological Association style
An upper-level under-graduate review of literature should take perhaps six to ten articles on a similar topic; try to get different points of view represented. The articles should come from research journals, not the popular press, and they should report on research studies. Tell what the study was about. Your review of each article should be presented in a narrative format, covering objectives, methodology, and findings. At the end of the paper, come to a conclusion in one or more paragraphs, tell us which point of view has the best evidence; do not express your opinion prior to this conclusion. Use proper references and citations. If you do not understand this paragraph, please read it again, several times if necessary. This assignment will be worth 100 points.
Research journals can be from any field (e.g., psychology, sociology, social work, counseling, nursing), just so the topic of the selected article is related in some way to death or bereavement, diversity and imagination are rewarded. Please do not think that recent references are necessarily better than older ones; this is often a value held by students, and it is shorthand for thinking; the quality of the article is what counts, not its age. Bound copies of many journals going back many years can be found in the University Library, on the lower level; current copies of these same journals are also available. There are five journals in particular which deal with the content of this course:
Omega- Journal of Death & Dying
Death Studies
Suicide and Life- Threatening Behavior
Journal of Near-Death Studies
Mortality
Other psychology, sociology, social and public health, and nursing journals often have very good research articles on topics relating to grief, death, and dying; the five above are simply the ones exclusively devoted to death-related topics. Having said all that, the instructor despairs of those who no doubt will ask, How long should the lit. review be? or, How many articles do I have to review? If you dont know the answers to these questions, please go back and read the previous page one more time.
Your topic does not need prior approval, just so it relates to the content of this course.
Plagiarism (copying directly from another source without citation) or other forms of academic dishonesty will not be forgiven.
