Guideline for conducting critical reviews in psychology research

Abstract

While numerous guidelines for conducting the various types of reviews are available within literature, there is limited information to inform researchers on how to conduct a critical review. We searched the following data bases for critical review guidelines: PsycARTICLES, PsycINFO, EBSCOhost, Directory of Open Access Journals, GoogleScholar, ScienceDirect, and ePublications Service. Six articles/chapters met the selection criteria. Thematic analysis of the data (literature) extracted resulted in a seven-step process inclusive of (i) Selecting and defining the review topic; (ii) Identifying the sources of relevant scientific literature; (iii) Selecting and deselecting prominent literature; (iv) Data extraction; (v) Analysing and synthesising extracted data; (vi) Presenting the review findings and discussion; and (vii) Conclusion and Recommendations. Future studies should consider implementation fidelity of critical review steps in articles that utilised critical review procedures.