literature review in clinical psychology

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Writing Research Papers

• Writing a Literature Review

When writing a research paper on a specific topic, you will often need to include an overview of any prior research that has been conducted on that topic.  For example, if your research paper is describing an experiment on fear conditioning, then you will probably need to provide an overview of prior research on fear conditioning.  That overview is typically known as a literature review.  

Please note that a full-length literature review article may be suitable for fulfilling the requirements for the Psychology B.S. Degree Research Paper .  For further details, please check with your faculty advisor.

Different Types of Literature Reviews

Literature reviews come in many forms.  They can be part of a research paper, for example as part of the Introduction section.  They can be one chapter of a doctoral dissertation.  Literature reviews can also “stand alone” as separate articles by themselves.  For instance, some journals such as Annual Review of Psychology , Psychological Bulletin , and others typically publish full-length review articles.  Similarly, in courses at UCSD, you may be asked to write a research paper that is itself a literature review (such as, with an instructor’s permission, in fulfillment of the B.S. Degree Research Paper requirement). Alternatively, you may be expected to include a literature review as part of a larger research paper (such as part of an Honors Thesis). 

Literature reviews can be written using a variety of different styles.  These may differ in the way prior research is reviewed as well as the way in which the literature review is organized.  Examples of stylistic variations in literature reviews include: 

• Summarization of prior work vs. critical evaluation. In some cases, prior research is simply described and summarized; in other cases, the writer compares, contrasts, and may even critique prior research (for example, discusses their strengths and weaknesses).
• Chronological vs. categorical and other types of organization. In some cases, the literature review begins with the oldest research and advances until it concludes with the latest research.  In other cases, research is discussed by category (such as in groupings of closely related studies) without regard for chronological order.  In yet other cases, research is discussed in terms of opposing views (such as when different research studies or researchers disagree with one another).

Overall, all literature reviews, whether they are written as a part of a larger work or as separate articles unto themselves, have a common feature: they do not present new research; rather, they provide an overview of prior research on a specific topic . 

How to Write a Literature Review

When writing a literature review, it can be helpful to rely on the following steps.  Please note that these procedures are not necessarily only for writing a literature review that becomes part of a larger article; they can also be used for writing a full-length article that is itself a literature review (although such reviews are typically more detailed and exhaustive; for more information please refer to the Further Resources section of this page).

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.  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.  For more information about this step, please see the Using Databases and Finding Scholarly References section of this website.

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.  For more details about taking notes, please see the “Reading Sources and Taking Notes” section of the Finding Scholarly References page of this website.

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.

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.

Further Tips for Writing a Literature Review

Full-length literature reviews

• Many full-length literature review articles use a three-part structure: Introduction (where the topic is identified and any trends or major problems in the literature are introduced), Body (where the studies that comprise the literature on that topic are discussed), and Discussion or Conclusion (where major patterns and points are discussed and the general state of what is known about the topic is summarized)

Literature reviews as part of a larger paper

• An “express method” of writing a literature review for a research paper is as follows: first, write a one paragraph description of each article that you read. Second, choose how you will order all the paragraphs and combine them in one document.  Third, add transitions between the paragraphs, as well as an introductory and concluding paragraph. 1
• A literature review that is part of a larger research paper typically does not have to be exhaustive. Rather, it should contain most or all of the significant studies about a research topic but not tangential or loosely related ones. 2   Generally, literature reviews should be sufficient for the reader to understand the major issues and key findings about a research topic.  You may however need to confer with your instructor or editor to determine how comprehensive you need to be.

Benefits of Literature Reviews

By summarizing prior research on a topic, literature reviews have multiple benefits.  These include:

• Literature reviews help readers understand what is known about a topic without having to find and read through multiple sources.
• Literature reviews help “set the stage” for later reading about new research on a given topic (such as if they are placed in the Introduction of a larger research paper). In other words, they provide helpful background and context.
• Literature reviews can also help the writer learn about a given topic while in the process of preparing the review itself. In the act of research and writing the literature review, the writer gains expertise on the topic .

Downloadable Resources

• How to Write APA Style Research Papers (a comprehensive guide) [ PDF ]
• Tips for Writing APA Style Research Papers (a brief summary) [ PDF ]
• Example APA Style Research Paper (for B.S. Degree – literature review) [ PDF ]

Further Resources

How-To Videos     

• Writing Research Paper Videos
• UCSD Library Psychology Research Guide: Literature Reviews

External Resources

• Developing and Writing a Literature Review from N Carolina A&T State University
• Example of a Short Literature Review from York College CUNY
• How to Write a Review of Literature from UW-Madison
• Writing a Literature Review from UC Santa Cruz  
• Pautasso, M. (2013). Ten Simple Rules for Writing a Literature Review. PLoS Computational Biology, 9 (7), e1003149. doi : 1371/journal.pcbi.1003149

1 Ashton, W. Writing a short literature review . [PDF]     

2 carver, l. (2014).  writing the research paper [workshop]. , prepared by s. c. pan for ucsd psychology.

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• Background Information
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What is a Literature Review?

If this is your first time having to do a literature review, you might be wondering what a "literature review" actually is. Typically, this entails searching through various databases to find peer-reviewed research within a particular topic of interest and then analyzing what you find in order to situate your own research within the existing works.

Watch the following video to learn more:

Video Transcript

What is Peer Review?

Most of your literature review will involve searching for sources that have gone through the peer-reviewed process. These are typically academic articles that have been published in scholarly journals and have been vetted by other experts with knowledge of the topic at hand.

How Do I Find Psychology Literature?

The following database are a great place to start to find relevant, peer-reviewed literature within the broad research area of psychology:

• APA PsycInfo This link opens in a new window From the American Psychological Association (APA), PsycINFO contains nearly 2.3 million citations and abstracts of scholarly journal articles, book chapters, books, and dissertations in psychology and related disciplines. It is the largest resource devoted to peer-reviewed literature in behavioral science and mental health.
• DynaMed This link opens in a new window A clinical reference tool of more than 3000 topics designed for physicians and health care professionals for use primarily at the point-of-care. DynaMed is updated daily and monitors the content of over 500 medical journal and systemic evidence review databases.
• EMBASE This link opens in a new window EMBASE is a major biomedical and pharmaceutical database indexing over 3,500 international journals in the following fields of health sciences and biomedical research. It is considered as the European version of Medline.
• MEDLINE with Full Text This link opens in a new window A bibliographic database that contains more than 26 million references to journal articles in life sciences with a concentration on biomedicine. A distinctive feature of MEDLINE is that the records are indexed with NLM Medical Subject Headings (MeSH®).

• PubMed This link opens in a new window PubMed® comprises more than 30 million citations for biomedical literature from MEDLINE, life science journals, and online books.
• Web of Science This link opens in a new window Web of Science is a comprehensive research database. It contains records of journal articles, patents, and conference proceedings, It also provides a variety of search and analysis tools. Web of Science Core Collection is a painstakingly selected, actively curated database of the journals that researchers themselves have judged to be the most important and useful in their fields
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• Last Updated: Aug 12, 2023 11:20 AM
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The clinical significance of loneliness: a literature review

Affiliation.

• 1 School of Psychology, Psychiatry, and Psychological Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, Nursing, and Health Sciences, Monash University, VIC 3800, Australia. [email protected]
• PMID: 16952717
• DOI: 10.1016/j.cpr.2006.04.002

Satisfying social relationships are vital for good mental and physical health. Accordingly, we recommend that the alleviation and prevention of social relationship deficits be a key focus of clinicians. In this review, we focus on loneliness as a crucial marker of social relationship deficits and contend that loneliness should command clinicians' attention in its own right--not just as an adjunct to the treatment of other problems such as depression. With a particular focus on the adolescent developmental period, this review is organized into five sections: Drawing on developmental and evolutionary psychology theories, the nature of social relationships and the function they serve is first discussed. In the second section, loneliness is introduced as an exemplar of social relationship deficits. Here a definition of loneliness is provided, as well as an explanation of why it may pose a situation of concern. This is followed by a review of the prototypic features of loneliness through examination of its affective, cognitive, and behavioral correlates. The fourth section includes a review of theories related to the antecedent and maintenance factors involved in loneliness. Finally, methodological and theoretical considerations are addressed, and conclusions and proposals for future research directions are put forth.

Publication types

• Affect / physiology
• Anxiety Disorders / epidemiology
• Anxiety Disorders / psychology
• Biological Evolution
• Depressive Disorder / epidemiology
• Depressive Disorder / psychology
• Health Services / statistics & numerical data
• Health Services Needs and Demand
• Health Status
• Interpersonal Relations
• Loneliness / psychology*
• Psychophysiologic Disorders / epidemiology
• Psychophysiologic Disorders / psychology
• Self Concept
• Social Behavior*

* Psychology: Literature Reviews

• Psychology Resources
• Literature Reviews
• Research Methods
• Tests and Measures
• Data and Analysis
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• EDPY 262: Community-Based Research Methods This link opens in a new window
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Journals Publishing Literature Reviews

While many scholarly journals may publish literature reviews, some psychology journals are exclusively or mainly devoted to publishing review articles.  When researching a topic, a relevant literature review is an excellent entry point for understanding concepts and the current state of research.

• Annual Review of Psychology
• Annual Review of Clinical Psychology
• Annual Review of Neuroscience
• Clinical Psychology Review
• Current Directions in Psychological Science
• Nature Reviews Neuroscience
• Perspectives on Psychological Science
• Psychological Bulletin
• Psychonomic Bulletin and Review
• Social and Personality Psychology Compass

Writing a Literature Review

Literature reviews analyze and evaluate previously published material on a topic. When they appear in journals, they are referred to as review articles. A systematic review is a kind of review that uses strict methods for identifying and synthesizing previous studies.

The literature review process. From Diana Ridley, The Literature Review: A Step-by-Step Guide for Students (2008), p. 81

For more information about writing a literature review as a senior thesis, see the Bates Psychology Department's Senior Thesis Proposal Guidelines page . Other resources include:

Baumeister, R. F., & Leary, M. R. (1997). Writing narrative literature reviews (PDF) . Review of General Psychology , 1, 311–320.

Bem, D. J. (1995). Writing a review article for Psychological Bulletin . Psychological Bulletin , 118(2), 172. doi:10.1037/0033-2909.118.2.172

University of Washington Psychology Writing Center.  Writing a Psychology Literature Review (PDF) .

Finding Literature Reviews in PsycINFO

PsycINFO is the premier research tool in psychology. One of its handiest features searching for articles by research methodology, including literature review. From the Advanced Search page, scroll down to the Methodology box in the lower right, and select Literature Review and Systematic Review. Then search the keywords related to your topic.

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• Updated: Jan 4, 2024 1:51 PM
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UCL Doctorate In Clinical Psychology

• Guidance for Stand-Alone Paper (SAP) Literature...

Guidance for Stand-Alone Paper (SAP) Literature Review

Aims of this page.

This page is intended to support trainees who are writing a Stand-Alone Paper (SAP) for their literature review. It will:

• Describe the steps needed to produce your SAP. Although SAP reviews vary in content and method, there is a common sequence of tasks to be accomplished.
• Signpost the resources available to support carrying out the SAP.

Sequence of steps

The table below describes the sequence of steps that you will need to take in order to complete your literature review.

At each step, you will need to make methodological decisions, and it is important that the finished SAP literature review be explicit about this process. For example, if at Step 3 ('Setting inclusion and exclusion criteria') you decide to exclude studies published before 1980, you will need to briefly explain why you did this.

Under some circumstances, you may have to deviate from this timetable. For example, the empirical project might require intensive data collection over the summer between the second and third year, meaning that the literature review has to be delayed. If you think you will be unable to submit a good draft in November of the third year, you should discuss this with your supervisor and come up with an alternative timetable.

Step 1 - Question formulation for the SAP

The SAP literature review asks a question (or linked questions) that can be answered by the empirical literature. Choosing a good question is not a trivial task; it takes time and effort. Here are some tips:

• The process of choosing a question is iterative. It involves coming up with some initial ideas and then using informal searches to get a sense of the body of relevant literature, and whether any reviews in the area have already been done. These initial searches will yield information that helps you to clarify your provisional questions. You will then go back to the literature, and this could cause further evolution of your questions.
• Involve your supervisor. They are an invaluable ally and guide in this iterative process of coming up with ideas and then exploring the literature.
• Make sure your question has some clinical relevance.
• The review topic should have a logical link to the empirical paper topic, so that there is a common thread running through the thesis. For example, the link could be a shared clinical phenomenon, population or intervention.

Relevance of previous reviews

It is common to come across already-published reviews that at least partially overlap with your own SAP literature review. This creates a dilemma: should you proceed with your review anyway, or find another question? The key issue is whether your review could potentially contribute substantial new knowledge, beyond that available from the already-published review(s). For example, several important new studies may have been published since the previous review. Or, perhaps your SAP question can be adjusted, to be wider or narrower.

Step 2 - Deciding on a review method

All literature reviews involve synthesising studies in order to answer a question, or a set of questions. There are different ways of doing this, i.e., there are different types of literature review. The type depends on the question, and the nature of the available literature. The main types are:

Narrative synthesis

This is the approach most commonly used for a SAP literature reveiw in DClinPsy thesis. Its defining characteristic is the "systematic review and synthesis of findings from multiple studies that relies primarily on the use of words and text to summarise and explain the findings of the synthesis" (Popay et al., University of Lancaster) .

You can find some examples of DClinPsy SAP literature reviews that use narrative syntheses, in the literarure reveiw section of the Research Project Support Moodle.

Meta-analysis

Meta-analysis is a procedure for statistically synthesising findings by aggregating effect sizes across several studies. It can be used to yield a useful summary statistic and also examine moderators, i.e., test whether there are study variables that influence effect sizes. Whilst meta-analysis is often used to synthesise group difference effect sizes from trials, it is actually a versatile technique that can provide a quantitative synthesis of different types of effect size statistics (e.g., odds ratios, correlations).

You can find some examples of DClinPsy SAP meta-analyses in the literature review section of the Research Project Support Moodle.

Getting help with meta-analysis

If you need help with your meta-analysis, the first person to consult is your supervisor. If you need additional support, Vyv Huddy and Amanda Williams are both happy to support trainees with their literature reviews, including meta-analyses, and should be contacted by email in the first instance.

Meta-analysis software

Review Manager (RevMan) is freely downloadable Cochrane Collaboration software developed for systematic review and meta-analysis, and is supported by information on the Cochrane site. It is especially straightforward to use for synthesising the outcomes of clinical trials. Amanda Williams offers support for use of RevMan.

In addition, the 'metan' routine in STATA is a useful tool for meta-analysis, and is available to trainees via the cluster room PCs and the UCL remote desk top. Vyv Huddy offers support for use of STATA for meta-analysis. Another option is the 'metafor' routine in R, which is freely downloadable. The course test library has a book on doing meta-analysis using STATA. To borrow this, please contact the research administrator.

Reviews of Qualitative Research: Meta Synthesis

Qualitative studies can be aggregated using a procedure called 'meta-synthesis', or 'qualitative meta-analysis'. The procedure is essentially a thematic analysis of the themes in each of the individual studies under review. The following reference is a useful introduction to this type of literature review:

Timulak, L. (2009). Meta-analysis of qualitative studies: A tool for reviewing qualitative research findings in psychotherapy. Psychotherapy Research , 19 (4-5), 591-600.

You can find an example of a DClinPsy SAP meta synthesis in the literature review section of the Research Project Support Moodle.

Step 3 - Setting inclusion and exclusion criteria

The inclusion and exclusion criteria translate the research question into a set of formal requirements for the papers to be reviewed. They are analogous to the inclusion and exclusion criteria in the empirical study, which explicitly state which participants you intend to recruit. They address the question of exactly which kinds of studies you are looking for to answer your question(s). The search strategy then will dictate how you locate these studies.

For reviews of interventions, and for some other review topics, it is often helpful to use the PICOS framework when setting out the inclusion and exclusion criteria, i.e. to specify the Population, Intervention, Comparator, Outcomes and Setting.

The quantity of studies

Trainees often ask 'how many studies do I have to review for a SAP?' Alas, there is no simple answer to this question. Fundamentally, the SAP literature review is intended to demonstrate your capacity to appraise and synthesise empirical evidence. This is demonstrated not just by the number of papers reviewed, but also on the richness of the information they convey and the quality of your synthesis.

In practice, most UCL DClinPsy SAP literature reviews cover more than 10 papers and fewer than 40. Nevertheless, some successful SAP literature reviews have covered fewer than 10 papers. Such reviews were enriched by various means, such as reviewing multiple outcomes or multiple assessment points and providing a deeper consideration of methodology.

SAP reviews rarely incorporate more than 40 studies and in this case would most often synthesise their findings using quantitative meta-analytic methods. A review can be undermined by trying to cover too many studies. If initial searches identify an excessive number of studies, then the review's scope can be narrowed.

Step 4 - Designing and conducting the search

The SAP literature review must be systematic, using a rigorous and transparent search of the literature in order to identify all studies that meet your inclusion criteria. The systematic search is the cornerstone of a good SAP literature review, as it ensures that a fair and balanced picture of current research is presented.

Conducting a systematic search for a DClinPsy literature review

The Cochrane Handbook offers guidance on systematic search procedures. However, for the DClinPsy, compromises are commonly made: e.g., only peer-reviewed papers, English language, and not emailing authors for missing information. Some of these compromises may need to be reconsidered if you subsequently prepare the paper for publication.

Support from Library Team

It is often useful, though it is not required, to discuss the search strategy with a UCL librarian. Librarians are experts in information retrieval, and the UCL Library Service has an identified Psychology specialist. A member of the UCL library team delivers specific session on carrying out your systematic search. This includes advice on:

· resources for identifying key concepts

· choosing an appropriate database

· defining search terms

· revising the search strategy

· hand searching

· removing duplicate items

· good practice in systematic searching.

A library services module is available on Moodle - WISE - provides further resources on these steps and can be found here (link: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/library/training/guides ).

Recording the search results

It may help to store and organise the information gathered by the search on a database. This could include the identified studies, recording duplicate publications of results, reasons for inclusion or exclusion, information that has been extracted and coded (demographics, clinical information, design, measures and main findings).

For your SAP reviews there is no obligation to have independent confirmation of study inclusion, data entry, coding of studies or for other researchers to check of the veracity of the database . This is often carried out in registered systematic reviews, and, if you wish to publish your review then this may be necessary. However, such 'double-checking' places unacceptable demands on trainees, who have to do their review in a limited amount of time.

Flow diagram using PRISMA format

The search should be depicted in a flow diagram, showing the stages from the search to the final set of studies, and indicating decisions and reasons for exclusion at each stage. The PRISMA statement (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) provides a framework that can be used for all kinds of reviews. When you present your SAP literature review in the thesis, it should contain a PRISMA diagram.

Step 5 - Synthesising the literature

Once you have identified the studies that meet your inclusion and exclusion criteria, it is time to embark upon the fundamental task of your SAP review: synthesising these studies in order to address your research question(s).

How you do this will depend upon the type of SAP review: for example, the method of synthesis is different for a meta-analysis compared to a narrative review. Nevertheless, it is always a good idea to create a table describing key features of your studies. This serves to summarise information, and can then give you ideas about themes and trends in the studies.

Quality appraisal / Risk of Bias

All SAP literature reviews involve a critical appraisal of the methodological quality of the included studies, and of how study quality impacts on interpretation of findings. Increasingly, researchers use structured measures, known as 'quality appraisal tools' to rate the quality of each study. There is a course document on the literature review section of the Research Project Support Moodle giving a list of these tools.

There is no requirement for trainees to use a quality appraisal tool in their literature review. Whether or not you use one will depend upon the nature of the literature you are reviewing, the question you are asking and whether a relevant tool exists. If the review concerns treatment efficacy based on findings of randomised controlled trials, a quality appraisal tool will normally be used, usually the Cochrane one called 'risk of bias'. On the other hand, many topics are not well suited to this sort of structured appraisal, or relevant appraisal tools may have not been developed.

The bottom line is that trainees should only use an appraisal tool if it will enhance their review. When thinking about whether to use one, it may be worth considering some of the criticisms that have been levelled at them:

• Lack depth necessary for certain specialist topics
• Items can be difficult to interpret (e.g. "study design evident and appropriate")
• Information required is often missing, and that can be authors' or journal editors' decision, so cannot be interpreted usefully.
• Single overall quality score is arbitrary, scoring serious defects (e.g. statistical flaws or inappropriate outcome measures were used) as the same weight as minor concerns (therapists could not be blinded to which intervention they delivered).

Step 6: Writing the SAP review

The SAP literature review has the format of a scientific paper, with sections entitled Introduction, Methods, Results and Discussion.

One commonly used approach to producing a first draft of the SAP is to initially write the Introduction and Methods sections, and to produce the table (or tables) describing the identified studies. This is then discussed with the supervisor, laying the ground for the Results and Discussion to be produced. It is important to talk to your supervisor early on in the process to agree the steps you will take towards producing a first draft.

All written work is improved via a process of drafts being critiqued. You should expect to receive in depth comments from your supervisor on your first draft; and to undertake substantial revisions when producing a second draft. You may need to go through further iterations to ensure the literature review is at the appropriate standard. Please see the section of the literature review on the 'Writing and presenting your thesis' for more information on the format and structure of this piece of work.

When writing the SAP literature review, be sure to cover research and clinical implications in your conclusions. Say what studies would best resolve uncertainties about your research question, and say what clinicians might decide to do in the light of current evidence. Recognise that clients will also read these, or they may be summarised for patient groups: think about what they want to know and how you can help meet that need, at least in part.

Length of the final draft

As a rule of thumb, reviews should be around 8,000 words, not including tables and references. If your review is longer than this, the chances are that it would be improved by being edited down.

Additional matters on the literature review

Publishing your sap review.

Trainee SAP literature reviews are original pieces of work that generate new understandings of clinically-important topics. They are often worth publishing. We recommend that, once you have the review written, you discuss this with your supervisor. They can help you decide what journal to target, and how the review will need to be modified in order to be considered for publication. You may need to do some work shortening the review, updating your search and getting someone to independently validate some steps of the review process (e.g., searches, data extraction). The PRISMA criteria described above often become a requirement at this stage; this depends on the editorial guidelines of specific journals.

There has been a lot of criticism of systematic reviews recently for concluding that the intervention may or may not be helpful and that more research is needed. That doesn't really say anything new, and is disappointing to clinicians, service users, and service funders and commissioners. It is far more helpful to be specific about what effects interventions have or do not have; how confident you can be in that finding (e.g., would it easily be overturned by the publication of a couple of large negative trials?), and what the 'more research' that is needed should look like. This draws on good features of the studies you reviewed, and tells people what to look for (or potential researchers what to do) that will advance the field.

Prospective registration of SAP reviews

Transparency is a vital aspect of published literature reviews. Review registration has emerged as a means of ensuring transparency by demonstrating that a review took place as planned, and can be replicated easily. This means the protocol cannot be amended at a later stage in response to disappointing results. The International Prospective Register of Systematic Reviews (link: https://www.crd.york.ac.uk/prospero/about.php?about=about ) has been developed to enable researchers to register their reviews and publish their protocol. To register a review, researchers complete an online form that prompts for a range of information concerning the protocol. This is a useful process while planning a review, regardless of whether the review is subsequently registered. There is no obligation for trainees to register their review but journals are increasingly asking for information regarding registration . This should be borne in mind if the trainee and supervisor plan to publish the review.

Discovering a similar review at a late stage of the process

Occasionally, as a trainee is coming to the end of producing their SAP literature review, they discover another recently-published review that substantially overlaps. It is important to recognise that under such circumstances, trainees are not expected to start again on another review. As long as the overlapping review was published after the trainee did their searches, examiners will be understanding. If you do discover that an overlapping review has been published, the important thing is to consult your supervisor and the Research Director. They can help you manage the situation.

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Clinical Psychology Capstone: Literature Review & Peer Review

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• Literature Review & Peer Review

Literature Review

What are the differences between literature reviews?

• Literature Review - A general summary, or overview of the topic that is typically qualitative and subjective
• Systematic Review - A type of literature review that answers a focused clinical question
• Meta-Analysis - A type of systematic review using statistical methods to combine data from systematic reviews

What is the best way to find literature reviews?

• PsycINFO - A psychology database with the capacity to limit by Methodology

How do I know a journal is peer reviewed?

• If searching in a database (eg: Social Work Abstracts,GenderWatch), select Peer Review from the Refine/Limit Results options.
• Check the journal's website:  look for the 'about' or 'about this journal' section.
• Check Ulrich's Periodicals Directory ; Search by journal name and look for the little black referee's jersey icon.
• Ask us : Call, text, email, or chat

What does Peer Review mean anyway?

When you submit an article to a journal, someone has to determine if it's worth printing.  Peer review was developed as a way to screen articles and determine the quality of your article. 

At a peer reviewed journal, the editor sends your article out to several reviewers (usually three) who are in the same field, or 'peers'.  Generally, your name will be taken off of the article so personalities don't interfer with the process.  The reviewers read through your article looking to see if:  the topic is unique or novel, if the data or research is sound, and if it's well written.  The reviewers can: reject the article; accept it with revisions; accept it as is.  

Benefits of peer review is that multiple people decide vs just the editor and the review process weeds out poorly written or researched articles.

Drawbacks of peer review is that it's only as good as the reviewers so poorly written or researched articles have gotten published.  Also, peer review was established as a way to check quality not catch fraud.

For more on peer review (I know that someone is interested...), check out Nature Peer Review Debate

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Referencing

Systematic Review Searching (for Clinical Psychology)

• The University of Edinburgh
• Subject guides

Clinical Psychology

Subject guide to library related topics.

Sources of help and advice as well as tips on finding academic literature for systematic and other reviews but applicable to any literature search purposes: what to use, how to search, what to keep, how to keep it and where.

These slides were put together to help those undertaking a systematic review as part of their Doctorate in Clinical Psychology. The presentation on the search part of the work involved, is split into six parts. The slides in each part are listed below with the approximate length of time of the recorded narration in brackets (minutes:seconds).

These powerpoint files are large and can take a bit of time to load/download/save.

The full set of slides are also available but without voice over narration which makes the file size smaller and therefore loading speeds quicker.

All slides without narration   [file size 1,113KB]

Part 1  [file size 24,154KB]

1 – Introduction (1:10). Transcript pdf

2 – Search workflow (6:30). Transcript pdf

3 – Search terms (9:00). Transcript pdf

Part 2  [file size 29,136KB]

4 – Subject specific databases (7:15). Transcript pdf

5 – Subject headings - default setting (psycINFO) (2:45). Transcript pdf

6 – Subject headings - context and scope notes (3:50). Transcript pdf

7 – Subject headings - the records returned (1:40). Transcript pdf

8 – Subject headings - used in a keyword search (4:20). Transcript pdf

Part 3  [file size 25,061KB]

9 – Phrases, truncation, search history & Boolean (6:50) Transcript pdf

10 – Search history - Ovid interface example (10:20) Transcript pdf

Part 4  [file size 26,841KB]

11 – Search more than one (Ovid hosted) database (5:50) Transcript pdf

12 – Search more than one (Ovid hosted) database contd (3:30) Transcript pdf

13 – Deduplication (2:30) Transcript pdf

14 – Numbers to note (6:25) Transcript pdf

Part 5  [file size 18,549KB]

15 – Records out (7:45) Transcript pdf

16 – Save details of search run (5:00) Transcript pdf

Part 6  [file size 27,219KB]

17 – Different interface – ProQuest (7:20) Transcript pdf

18 – Different interface – ProQuest contd (5:12) Transcript pdf

19 – Help sources (6:00) Transcript pdf

20 – Inter-Library Loan service – use to get reading material the University of Edinburgh Library does not have (no narration)

21 – Reference management software – includes link to the University pages from which to get free EndNote desktop (no narration)

LibSmart II: Literature Searching for Systematic Reviews

Literature Searching for Systematic Reviews is a module on Learn's LibSmart II course and is designed to provide guidance on what literature searching methods are relevant for robust systematic reviews:

• What is a systematic review?
• Why are you doing a literature review?
• Wait! Where's your protocol?
• Draft your search plan.
• Reporting search methods.
• Building complex searches for systematic reviews.
• Mapping your research question.
• Translating searches between databases.
• Moving between databases: what needs to be translated?
• Testing your search for relevance and quality.
• Managing search results.
• Methods guidance and tools.

Information about how to enrol on LibSmart II

Cochrane Interactive Learning

Cochrane Interactive Learning is self-paced learning modules on the full process for conducting systematic reviews according to Cochrane Collaboration guidance. There are 11 modules plus exercises and quizzes.

The first time you use this resource, you need to register to create account so that your progress may be recorded and you can pick up where you left off. There is a two-stage registration process – if you already have a Cochrane account, you can skip the first step.

Step by step registration guide .

Access once registered

Abstracting & Indexing Databases - which to use

For a systematically conducted literature review, you will be expected to use relevant Abstracting & Indexing databases (databases) which contain details of journal articles (theses, conference papers and some book chapters).

Databases (and other resources) with content relevant to clinical psycology topics, are listed on the webpage below.

Clinical Psychology databases

 - Get to a database by clicking on/selecting its title.

You will see on that page a description for each database to help you decide which may be appropriate to use for your review. However...

...you will be expected to have used:

• The main one for psychology or psychiatry.
• The main clinical medicine one.
• PubMed is the free interface to MEDLINE.
• The Library’s links are to a search platform/interface called “Ovid”.

Others to consider include:

• Another clinical medicine database but good for coverage of European journals which MEDLINE may not index.
• Use if your topic is connected to developing countries.

Both of these can be searched at the same time as psycINFO and MEDLINE because we buy access to them from the search platform “Ovid”. This also allows you to get some deduplication done by the search platform.

• The main nursing one.

If the professionals or population you are interested in are community based consider:

• ASSIA (Applied Social Science Index and Abstracts).
• Sociological Abstracts.

If your topic includes school based interventions or happens in schools, use:

The databases tend to cover theses in their subject areas but if you want to know you have searched across all subject areas, include:

• ProQuest Dissertations and Theses Global

These last four can all be searched together because they are hosted on the same search platform, called “ProQuest”.

Theses databases

Appraising a search for quality

As well as testing a search set against known papers, Table 1. PRESS 2015 Guideline Evidence-Based Checklist in the McGowan et al (2016) article can be used to assess your strategy.

McGowan, J., Sampson, M., Salzwedel, D. M., Cogo, E., Foerster, V., & Lefebvre, C. (2016). PRESS Peer Review of Electronic Search Strategies: 2015 Guideline Statement. Journal of Clinical Epidemiology, 75, 40-46.

The following Dissertation Festival recording was made on 17th March 2021:

How to test your systematic review searches for quality and relevance

The session covered:

• Use of known and eligible publications to test for recall
• Sampling intermediate records for “illogically irrelevant” and “want to screen” results
• How to interpret and apply the PRESS checklist (McGowan et al article above)

Other resources to search

Resources dedicated to grey literature are not usually designed for complicated search strategies, so pick a couple of concepts at most, and search on the main terms. Content is usually theses and government publications.

Grey literature databases

Other sources of research which could meet your relevancy and inclusion/exclusion criteria:

• Any charities which fund research in your area of interest but which do not publish reports in academic journals.
• Workplace in-house reports.

If you are thinking about using either of the following, bear in mind:

• Whereas A&I databases are products other researchers can use (if they belong to somewhere which subscribes), DiscoverEd is theoretically different for you as members of the University of Edinburgh able to Sign In, than it is for those unable to Sign In.
• Does not accommodate complicated searches to the same degree as the A&I databases.
• If you are able to screen all the results a Google Scholar search returns, you will have used it systematically.
• Alternatively, state in your methodology how many results you screened, eg first X results.

What you are aiming at

Previously awarded DClin theses are available to read in the Edinburgh Research Archive (ERA):

Health in Social Science thesis collection

Appraisal Checklists

Checklists or critical appraisal tools/worksheets are designed to help with the evaluation (reliability and relevance) of reading material found. There are different checklists for reports of different research methodologies, eg randomised control trials, cohort studies, economic studies. They can also help you think about your search strategy as well as being used as templates should you be publishing research of a particular methodology.

PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) is the source of commonly used flow diagrams used to present to readers how the results of a search focus as the screening process progresses. In addition it has checklists for assessing the quality of a systematic review and, in the Extensions section, for other types of reviews as well:

PRISMA statement

Critical Appraisal Skills Programme (CASP) provides resources to enable systematic assessment of the trustworthiness, relevance and results of published papers.Checklists provided are for RCTs, systematic reviews, qualitative, diagnostic and case control studies, also economic evaluation and clinical prediction rule.

CASP Checklists

Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine (CEBM)'s critical appraisal tools are for systematic reviews, diagnostics, prognosis, RCTs, qualitative studies and IPD review.

CEBM Critical Appraisal worksheets

Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) critical appraisal tools include analytical cross sectional studies, case control studies, case reports, case series, cohort studies, diagnostic test accuracy studies, economic evaluations prevalence studies, qualitative research, quasi-experimental studies, RCTs, systematic reviews and for text and opinion:

JBI critical appraisal tools

The “Journal of Mixed Methods Research” in 2019 presented in an editorial its checklist for authors .

Fetters, M. D., & Molina-Azorin, J. F. (2019) A Checklist of Mixed Methods Elements in a Submission for Advancing the Methodology of Mixed Methods Research, Journal of Mixed Methods Research, 13(4), 414-423. https://doi.org/10.1177/1558689819875832

Naicker’s Critically Appraising for Antiracism Tool is a supplementary tool developed to support appraisers in explicitly addressing racial bias and available, with supporting documentation, from the author's Critically Appraising for Antiracism website.

Critically Appraising for Antiracism

ROBIS (Risk Of Bias In Systematic reviews) from Population Health Sciences at the University of Bristol is a checklist for assessing systematic reviews:

ROBIS - Risk Of Bias In Systematic reviews

SIGN checklists are for systematic reviews and meta-analyses, RCTs, cohort, case-control, diagnostic and economic studies.

SIGN Checklists

NICE guidelines' manual (NICE process and methods [PMG20]) in Appendix H, assigns appraisal checklists to study type.

NICE: Tools and Resources for Appendix H: Appraisal checklists, evidence tables, GRADE and economic profiles

In 2014, Appendix 2 of NICE's Interim methods guide for developing service guidance,  NICE process and methods [PMG8] provided the checklists:

• 1.1 Checklist: cost–benefit analysis (CBA) studies
• 1.2 Checklist: cost–consequence analysis (CCA) studies
• 1.3 Checklist: audit
• 1.4 Checklist: surveys
• 1.5 Checklist: studies of national, regional or local reports, assessments or evaluations
• 1.6 Checklist: longitudinal studies
• 1.7 Checklist: cross-sectional studies
• 1.8 Checklist: secondary data studies
• 1.9 Checklist: grey literature
• 1.10 Checklist: systematic reviews (non-randomised controlled trials)
• 1.11 Checklist: mixed-methods reviews

Please contact me if you have any problems or questions when it comes to the literature searching part of your review.

I am also very happy to arrange to speak to individuals or small groups.

Rowena Stewart, Academic Support Librarian (Health in Social Science)

[email protected] (she/her)

Research question thinking

The Little Book of Literature Searching

Thinking about your topic - more search terms, inclusion/exclusion criteria

For health related topics, a research question framework is often used to guide identification of what would make a piece of work useful.

PICOS/T, PEO, PICo, SPIDER Frameworks (plus ECLIPSe and SPICE) (pdf)

Thinking about your topic in this way:

Helps more clearly define the research you are willing to use.

Can add to your stock of search terms.

Helps set the criteria by which you choose to include, or exclude, results returned by your search(es).

Assigning aspects of your research question to PICO(S/T) headings is common:

P opulation/ P articipants [incl. P roblem], I ntervention, C omparison, O utcome, S tudy Type/ T ime ( PICOS / T ).

Examples are provided in the subsections to 3.2.4 Inclusion criteria, JBI Manual for Evidence Synthesis .

Some research questions will have multiple entries for some headings, eg both parents and their children, or educators and the population they educate. Other research questions may not lend themselves to populating all of the headings and for others, a different framework is more appropriate.

Be taken through the process of mapping your topic to the PICO framework to creating the basis of a search strategy:

Hull York Medical School Library's Creating a PICO scenario

Alternative frameworks which may help fully develop the scope of what the literature needs to address and which are a better fit for your topic:

P opulation, E xposure, O utcome ( PEO ).

Explore this further in Kestenbaum, B. (2019) General considerations in epidemiological research, In: Epidemiology and biostatistics: an introduction to clinical research . 2nd edn. Cham: Springer Nature.

P opulation, P henomena of I nterest, Co ntext ( PICo )

Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) advises PICo for eg its systematic reviews of qualitative evidence - Section 2.6.2 Review question, JBI Manual for Evidence Synthesis

S ample, P henomena of I nterest, D esign, E valuation, R esearch ( SPIDER )

Cooke, A., Smith, D. and Booth, A. (2012) Beyond PICO: The SPIDER Tool for Qualitative Evidence Synthesis , Qualitative Health Research , 22(10), 1435–1443.

University of Maryland Libraries' guide for a longer list with suggestions of discipline or type of question for which each could be useful:

Developing a research question: Frameworks

City, University of London's Library guide includes two Maryland does not:

Using a framework to structure your question

Videos - search interfaces

Subject heading searches in cinahl plus, medline and psycinfo.

PDF summary of Subject Heading searches in CINAHL Plus, MEDLINE and psycINFO

Using the Search History to build a search

PDF Summary of Using the Search History to build a search

Saving your Search History steps to run in the future

PDF Summary of Saving your Search History steps to run in the future

Searching more than one database at once and de-duplication by the search platform

PDF Summary of Searching more than one database at once and de-duplication by the search platform

Saving your search methodology and result numbers

PDF Summary of Saving your search methodology and result numbers

Exporting database results from the EbscoHost and Ovid platforms

PDF Summary of Exporting database results from the EbscoHost and Ovid platforms

Reference management

For more help with referencing, please see:

If you decide EndNote is a reference management software tool you want to use, you can download the desktop version of EndNote for your own machine.

Use the University form to get EndNote desktop for free

Review management software

For systematic reviews, there are online tools that can help with the screening and reviewing processes.

Covidence provides free account creation for up to 500 records. Instead, make use of the University of Edinburgh's subscription to load your records (more than 500 if that is what you have) for de-duplication* and screening.

Covidence is a web-based tool and reviewers can work on the same set of records.

Covidence’s University of Edinburgh sign-up page

• register using your University of Edinburgh email address.

Webinar schedule on the Covidence Knowledgebase page - scroll down

More about Covidence

Plus the Covidence Academy for:

• Guides on key steps in the systematic review process.
• Step by step video tutorials to get the best out of the Covidence platform.

Rayyan is a freely available systematic review tool from Qatar Computing Research Institute.

Rayyan QCRI

*always do a manual check after any system of automatic de-duplication.

Review Protocols

It is possible to post or publish a review or meta-analysis protocol, just as it is possible to register prospective clinical trials. A registered review "marks territory" and provides an indication of time and money being better spent reviewing a different research question. However, not all registered review protocols result in a published review.

There is a PRISMA checklist (produced in 2015) for systematic review protocols which may help in their completion.

PRISMA for systematic review protocols (PRISMA-P)

Protocol Registers include:

JBI Systematic Review Register - systematic and scoping review protocols of JBI (Joanna Briggs Institute) affiliates.

PROSPERO: International prospective register of systematic reviews.

Resources which accept (without charge) other review protocols and research output:

Figshare - open repository of research output.

Research Registry - "all types of research studies".

Open Science Framework - "protocols and other research materials".

University of Edinburgh Research Explorer - research output of members of the University.

Some journals accept review protocols for publication.

To find a suitable journal, go to an abstracting and indexing database strong in your subject area, do a title search for "review protocol" in combination with a search term relevant to yours and then use the Refine type options to see the journal titles which appear most frequently in the results.

N.B. Publication fees may accompany publication.

Scoping Reviews

"A scoping review seeks to explore and define conceptual and logistic boundaries around a particular topic with a view to informing a future predetermined systematic review or primary research."

Sutton, A., Clowes, M., Preston, L., & Booth, A. (2019). Meeting the review family: exploring review types and associated information retrieval requirements. Health Information & Libraries Journal, 36(3), 202-222. https://doi.org/10.1111/hir.12276

"The method adopted for identifying literature in a scoping study needs to achieve in‐depth and broad results. Rather than being guided by a highly focussed research question that lends itself to searching for particular study designs (as might be the case in a systematic review), the scoping study method is guided by a requirement to identify all relevant literature regardless of study design."

Arksey, H. & O'Malley, L. (2005) Scoping studies: towards a methodological framework, International Journal of Social Research Methodology, 8(1), 19-32. https://www-tandfonline-com.ezproxy.is.ed.ac.uk/doi/full/10.1080/1364557032000119616

Introduction to JBI (Joanna Briggs Insitute) Manual for Evidence Synthesis: Scoping Reviews Protocol chapter

University of South Australia's Scoping Reviews Library Guide

PRISMA for Scoping Reviews is a checklist of 20 essential reporting items and 2 optional items to include when completing a scoping review.

PRISMA for Scoping Reviews

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Loneliness: Clinical Import and Interventions

Stephanie cacioppo.

1 Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience, The University of Chicago

2 HPEN Laboratory, Center for Cognitive and Social Neuroscience, The University of Chicago

Angela J. Grippo

3 Department of Psychology, Northern Illinois University

Sarah London

4 Department of Psychology, The University of Chicago

Luc Goossens

5 School of Psychology and Child and Adolescent Development, KU Leuven – University of Leuven

John T. Cacioppo

In 1978, when the Task Panel report to the US President’s Commission on Mental Health emphasized the importance of improving health care and easing the pain of those suffering from emotional distress syndromes including loneliness, few anticipated that this issue would still need to be addressed 40 years later. A meta-analysis ( Masi et al., 2011 ) on the efficacy of treatments to reduce loneliness identified a need for well-controlled randomized clinical trials focusing on the rehabilitation of maladaptive social cognition. We review assessments of loneliness and build on this meta-analysis to discuss the efficacy of various treatments for loneliness. With the advances made over the past 5 years in the identification of the psychobiological and pharmaceutical mechanisms associated with loneliness and maladaptive social cognition, there is increasing evidence for the potential efficacy of integrated interventions that combine (social) cognitive behavioral therapy with short-term adjunctive pharmacological treatments.

Life in America in the 21 st century is unlike any period in human history. People are living longer than ever before, and the rise in the Internet has transformed how Americans work, play, search, shop, study, communicate, and relate to one another. People are increasingly connected digitally, but the prevalence of loneliness (perceived social isolation) also appears to be rising. From a prevalence estimated to be 11–17% in the 1970s ( Peplau, Russell, & Heim, 1979 ), loneliness has increased to over 40% in middle aged and older adults 1 ( Edmondson, 2010 ; Perissinotto, Cenzer, & Covinsky, 2012 ). Over the past 40 years, loneliness has also become more widespread overseas (e.g., Victor, Scambler, Bowling, & Bond, 2005 ; Randall, 2012 ; Victor & Yang, 2012 ; Stickley et al., 2013 ). For instance, a 2010 survey from Statistics New Zealand shows that 33% of individuals aged 15 and above experienced loneliness in the four weeks preceding the survey. In the U.K., prevalence of loneliness is estimated between 5%–6% (for individuals reporting feeling “often” lonely), 21%–31% (for individuals reporting feeling “sometimes” lonely; Victor et al., 2005 ; Victor & Yang, 2012 ), and prevalence rates as high as 45% have been reported throughout the U.K. according to an online survey that took place in March 2010 ( Griffin, 2010 ). As the prevalence of loneliness rises, evidence accrues that loneliness is a major risk factor for poor physical and mental health outcomes.

Definition of Loneliness

Psychiatrist Fromm-Reichmann (1959) raised awareness of loneliness and noted the need for a rigorous, scientific definition of loneliness. In the decades that followed, loneliness as a psychological condition was characterized, and measures for quantifying individual differences were introduced (e.g., Lynch & Convey, 1979 ; Peplau, Russell, & Heim, 1979 ; Russell, Peplau, & Cutrona, 1980 ; Weiss, 1973 ). Loneliness corresponds to a discrepancy between an individual’s preferred and actual social relations ( Peplau & Perlman, 1982 ). This discrepancy then leads to the negative experience of feeling alone and/or the distress and dysphoria of feeling socially isolated even when among family or friends ( Weiss, 1973 ). This definition underscores the fact that feeling alone or lonely does not necessarily mean being alone nor does being alone necessarily mean feeling alone (see J. T. Cacioppo et al., this issue). One can feel lonely in the crowd or in a marriage. Reciprocally, one may enjoy being alone (a pleasant state defined as solitude; Tillich, 1959 ) at times in order to reach personal growth experiences (such as those achieved through solitary meditation or mindfulness exercises) or to simply take a temporary break from dealing with the demands of modern life.

Loneliness emphasizes the fact that social species require not simply the presence of others but also the presence of significant others whom they can trust, who give them a goal in life, with whom they can plan, interact, and work together to survive and prosper ( J. T. Cacioppo & Patrick, 2008 ). Moreover, the physical presence of significant others in one’s social environment is not a sufficient condition. One needs to feel connected to significant others to not feel lonely. Accordingly, one can be temporarily alone and not feel lonely as they feel highly connected with their spouse, family, and/or friends – even at a distance. Subjectivity and perception of the friendly or hostile nature of one’s social environment is, thus, a characteristic of loneliness. As comedian Robin Williams said: “I used to think the worst thing in life was to end up all alone. It’s not. The worst thing in life is to end up with people who make you feel all alone” (2009). Although this crucial component of loneliness helps better differentiate subjective social isolation (loneliness) from objective social isolation, it has led occasionally to a conflation of loneliness and other dysphoric states (e.g., social anxiety, depression) in which a person’s subjective experiencing of their social environment plays also a crucial role.

A main challenge for physicians and mental health clinicians has been, therefore, to become sufficiently informed about the scientific definition of loneliness so that other mental disorders were not mistakenly diagnosed and treated when loneliness was either the primary presenting problem or the cause of the depression for which treatment was sought ( Booth, 2000 ). For instance, because loneliness and depression share some characteristics and a correlation ranging from .38 to .71 (cf., Booth, 2000 ; J. T. Cacioppo et al., 2006 ), many clinicians believed, for decades, that loneliness was simply an aspect of depression with no distinct concept worthy of study (cf. Young, 1982 ). There is now considerable evidence showing that loneliness and depression are separable and that loneliness increases the risk for depression ( J. T. Cacioppo et al., 2006 ; Heinrich & Gullone, 2006 ). In 1980, for instance, Weeks et al. administered loneliness and depression scales to undergraduate college students. Using data from 333 subjects, they concluded that loneliness and depression, though correlated with each other, were “clearly different constructs.” These results have been replicated and extended in recent longitudinal research ( J. T. Cacioppo et al., 2010 ; VanderWeele et al., 2011 ), and reinforced Ostrov and Offer’s (1978) clinical observation that a potential difference between loneliness and depression was that while both are filled with helplessness and pain, loneliness is characterized by the hope that all would be perfect if only the lonely person could be united with another longed for person.

Who Can Feel Lonely?

Loneliness does not discriminate. Although loneliness is more likely in populations who are at risk for social alienation, isolation, and separation (such as older individuals who live alone and are isolated from friends and families; patients with psychiatric disorders; patients with long-term health conditions that limit their communicative capacities or mobility; and/or stigmatized groups; for reviews see Andersson, 1998 , J. T. Cacioppo in this special issue), anyone can feel lonely at any time. For instance, the same objective social relationship can be perceived as caring and protective or as exploitive and isolating based on a host of factors including an individual’s prior experiences, current attributions, and overall preference for social contact ( J. T. Cacioppo, Cacioppo, Capitanio, & Cole, 2015 ). Accordingly, loneliness is not limited to older adults who are infirmed and live alone but is evident across the lifespan and is even evident in people surrounded by large numbers of other young adults or with numerous contacts/followers/friends on social media (e.g., Qualter et al., this issue).

Dimensions of Loneliness

Loneliness is a complex construct that includes three related facets or dimensions: 1) Intimate loneliness; 2) Relational loneliness; and 3) Collective loneliness ( Hawkley et al., 2005 ; Hawkley, Gu, Luo, & Cacioppo, 2012 ). These three dimensions match the three dimensions surrounding one’s attentional space ( Hall, 1963 , 1966 ; Figure 1 ): intimate space (the closest space surrounding a person), social space (the space in which people feel comfortable interacting with family and acquaintances), and the public space (a more anonymous space). These three dimensions of loneliness also appear to share some correspondence with the structure of human personal social networks identified by Weiss (1973) and Dunbar (2014 ; Figure 1 ). The translation of these three dimensions into a structured attentional personal space ( Ortigue, Megevand, Perren, Landis, & Blanke, 2006 ; Ortigue et al., 2003 ; Rizzolatti et al., 1983 , 1987 ) are interesting in light of analyses of the mental organization for people’s loneliness/social connection ( Figure 1 ). In loneliness, these three dimensions have been found in various populations, such as college students ( Hawkley et al., 2005 ; McWhirter, 1990b ) and older adults in the U.S. ( Hawkley et al., 2005 ; Peplau & Perlman, 1982 ), and in young and older adults in China. ( Hawkley et al., 2012 ) 2 . Each dimension also corresponds to different types of loneliness.

The three dimensions of loneliness and different compartments of space.

Intimate Loneliness

Intimate loneliness, or what Weiss (1973) termed emotional loneliness, refers to the perceived absence of a significant someone (e.g., a spouse), that is, a person one can rely on for emotional support during crises, who provides mutual assistance, and who affirms one’s value as a person. This form of intimate connection often has considerable self-other overlap (such as that observed between close friends e.g., husband-wife, best-friends; Hall, 1966 ; Ortigue et al., 2003 , 2006 ). This dimension corresponds to what Dunbar described as the inner core , which can include up to 5 people (the “support clique”) and comprises the people we rely on for emotional support during crises ( Dunbar, 2014 ).

A population-based study of middle-age and older adults showed that the best (negative) predictor of intimate loneliness was marital status, indicating that intimate partners tend to be a primary source of attachment, emotional connection, and emotional support for adults ( Hawkley et al., 2005 ). These results are consistent with several studies indicating that having a significant partner/spouse is associated with lower levels of intimate loneliness and, reciprocally that losing a partner (through divorce or widowhood) is linked to greater intimate loneliness (e.g., J. T. Cacioppo & Patrick, 2008 ; Hughes et al., 2004 ; Lopata, Heinemann, & Baum, 1982 ; Russell, 1982 ; Waite & Gallagher, 2001 ; Weiss, 1973 ).

Relational Loneliness

The second dimension is relational loneliness, or what Weiss (1973) termed social loneliness. It refers to the perceived presence/absence of quality friendships or family connections, that is, connections from the “sympathy group” ( Buys & Larson, 1979 ; Dunbar, 2014 ) within one’s relational space. According to Dunbar the “sympathy group” can include among 15 and 50 people and comprises core social partners whom we see regularly and from whom we can obtain high-cost instrumental support (e.g. loans, help with projects, child care; Dunbar, 2014 ).

The relational space is delimitated by the multi-modal (visual, auditory, and tactile) space that permits face-to-face communications and interactions. Like intimate loneliness, social loneliness is found in women as well as men, although there is some evidence that this dimension may tend to play a slightly greater role in influencing loneliness in women than in men ( Hawkley et al., 2005 ). The best (negative) predictor of relational loneliness in middle-aged and older adults is the frequency of contact with significant friends and family, even after statistically controlling for the other two dimensions of loneliness ( Hawkley et al., 2005 ). Nevertheless, it is not the quantity of friends, but the quality of significant friends/confidants that counts ( Hawkley et al., 2008 ). This point is crucial when diagnosing loneliness.

Collective Loneliness

The third dimension is collective loneliness, an aspect that Weiss (1973) did not identify in his qualitative studies. Collective loneliness refers to a person’s valued social identities or “active network” (e.g., group, school, team, or national identity) wherein an individual can connect to similar others at a distance in the collective space. As such, this dimension may correspond to what Dunbar (2014) described as the outermost social layer, which can include among 150 and 1500 people (the “active network”) who can provide with information through weak ties ( Granovetter, 1973 ), as well as low-cost support ( Dunbar, 2014 ). The best (negative) predictor of collective loneliness found in middle-age and older adults was the number of voluntary groups to which individuals belonged: the more voluntary associations to which individuals belonged, the lower their collective loneliness, again even after statistically controlling for the two other dimensions. This dimension of loneliness is found in women as well as men but tends to be slightly more heavily weighted in men than in women ( Hawkley et al., 2005 ). The emergence of a collective dimension of loneliness suggests that we may have evolved the capacity for and motivation to form relationships not only with other individuals but also with groups (e.g., villages or armies), with the consequence being the promotion of social identification and cooperation in adverse conditions (e.g., competition, hunting, or warfare; Brewer, 2004 ). The identification with and investments in the group, in turn, may increase the likelihood of the continuity of the group, its members, and their individual genetic legacy ( J. T. Cacioppo, Cacioppo, & Boomsma, 2014 ).

Consequences of Loneliness

Loneliness can contribute to a constellation of physical and psychiatric dysfunctions and/or psychosocial risk factors, including depressive symptomatology ( J. T. Cacioppo et al., 2006 ; J. T. Cacioppo, Hawkley, & Thisted, 2010 ; VanderWeele, Hawkley, Thisted, & Cacioppo, 2011 ), alcoholism ( Akerlind & Hornquist, 1992 ), suicidal thoughts ( Rudatsikira, Muula, Siziya, & Twa-Twa, 2007 ), aggressive behaviors, social anxiety, and impulsivity (e.g., S. Cacioppo, Capitanio, & Cacioppo, 2014 ; Ernst & Cacioppo, 1999 ; Kearns et al., 2014 ). In addition, loneliness is a risk factor for cognitive decline and the progression of Alzheimer’s Disease ( Wilson et al., 2007 ), recurrent stroke (for review see S. Cacioppo, Capitanio, & Cacioppo, 2014 ), obesity ( Lauder, Mummery, Jones, & Caperchione, 2006 ), increased vascular resistance ( J. T. Cacioppo, Hawkley, Crawford et al., 2002 ), elevated blood pressure ( J. T. Cacioppo, Hawkley, Crawford et al., 2002 ; Hawkley et al., 2006 ), increased hypothalamic pituitary adrenocortical activity ( Adam, Hawkley, Kudielka, & Cacioppo, 2006 ; Steptoe, Owen, Kunz-Ebrecht, & Brydon, 2004 ), decreased sleep salubrity ( J. T. Cacioppo, Hawkley, Berntson et al., 2002 ; Pressman et al., 2005 ), diminished immunity ( Kiecolt-Glaser et al., 1984a b ; Pressman et al., 2005 ), an under-expression of genes bearing anti-inflammatory glucocorticoid response elements and an upregulation of pro-inflammatory gene transcripts ( Cole et al., 2007 , 2011), abnormal ratios of circulating white blood cells (e.g., neutrophils, lymphocytes, and monocytes; Cole, 2008 ), and premature mortality (e.g., Luo et al., 2012 ).

Interventions to Reduce Loneliness

Increased recognition of loneliness as a risk factor for adverse psychological and physical health outcomes has elevated interest in interventions to reduce chronic loneliness. For instance, the British government is developing several initiatives aiming to improve the life quality and satisfaction of people suffering from the (real or perceived) absence of social relationships ( Victor, Scambler, Bowling, & Bond, 2005 ). Campaigns designed to raise awareness about the growing problem of loneliness and isolation have also been launched in the United Kingdom by five partner organizations ( http://www.campaigntoendloneliness.org/about-the-campaign/ ), in Denmark by the Crown Princess and her Mary Foundation ( http://www.maryfonden.dk/en/loneliness ) and the DaneAge Association (Ældre Sagen; http://www.aeldresagen.dk/presse/nyheder/Sider/Folkebevaegelse-skal-bryde-tabu-om-ensomhed.aspx ), in Canada by the Canadian Seniors Council ( http://www.seniorscouncil.gc.ca/eng/home.shtml ), and in the United States by Oprah Winfrey, Sanjay Gupta, and Gayle King and supported by Skype ( http://www.oprah.com/health/Just-Say-Hello-Fight-Loneliness ), the AARP Foundation Initiative on Social Isolation ( http://www.aarp.org/aarp-foundation/our-work/isolation/ ), and the Do-It Campaign to end isolation ( http://women.oshkoshareacf.org/endisolation ). These campaigns are essential to raise awareness about and to reduce the stigma surrounding loneliness, but these represent only a first step. Effective treatments are also needed.

Different types of treatments

To date, there have been a number of attempts to mitigate loneliness. Such interventions include one-on-one interventions (e.g., befriending, Mead et al., 2010 ; or mentoring, Dickens et al., 2011 ), group therapy (e.g., groups of lonely people), and wider community interventions (e.g., community events reaching out to a lonely person/s; Cattan et al., 2005 ; Findlay, 2003 ; Masi et al., 2011 for reviews). Most of them have been based on the intuitive understanding of loneliness. For instance, a first model has been to provide social support to lonely individuals. That said, as described above, loneliness is not only about getting support, it is also about giving support back and mutual aid.

A second model has been to increase opportunities for social interaction. But, as noted above, a large number of contacts is not equivalent to high quality relationships ( Masi et al., 2011 ). Effects of our own mentation (what we think, what we perceive) involves both conscious and nonconscious mechanisms. Even if lonely individuals want to connect, their non-conscious hypervigilance for social threat can lead them to be negative with or withdraw from others.

A third model to reduce loneliness is based on teaching lonely people to master social skills. For unfortunate individuals who lack of social skills, this may be effective but people are lonely for many reasons other than poor social skills. Experimental research in which loneliness was manipulated shows that most adults have at least minimal social skills, but these adults are more likely to call upon these social skills when they feel low rather than high in loneliness ( Cacioppo et al., 2006 ).

Which type of behavioral intervention is most effective to reduce loneliness?

We addressed this question in a quantitative meta-analysis on the efficacy of the various treatments tested to reduce loneliness between 1970 and 2009 ( Masi et al., 2011 ), and we investigated various moderator variables, such as the experimental design (single group pretest-posttest; nonrandomized comparison group; randomized comparison group) and intervention format (individual or group). Results showed that the mean effect size was much lower when appropriate experimental and statistical controls were implemented, with the effect size for nonrandomized group comparison studies being −.459, and single-group pretest-posttest designs being −.367, whereas the effect size for randomized controlled studies being −.198. This finding implies that if a program or intervention to reduce loneliness is to be evaluated for efficacy – including large-scale programs such as those being introduced in the United States, Canada, Denmark, and the United Kingdom – it is important to control for potential confounding variables (time, expectancy effects, Hawthorne effects, confounding individual differences) to avoid biases that are likely to lead to an overestimate of treatment efficacy.

Contrary to the conclusion of previous narrative reviews carried out since the 1980s, Masi et al.’s (2011) quantitative literature review revealed little evidence for better efficacy of one-to-one individual therapies compared to group therapies. Type of intervention program was a significant moderator, however. Twenty studies met the criteria for randomized group comparison design, and all four primary types of interventions known to reduce loneliness were present in this group. These four primary types of intervention programs were (a) those that increased opportunities for social contact (e.g., social recreation intervention), (b) those that enhanced social support (e.g., through mentoring programs, Buddy-care program, conference calls), (c) those that focused on social skills (e.g., speaking on the phone, giving and receiving compliments, enhancing nonverbal communication skills), and (d) those that addressed maladaptive social cognition (e.g., cognitive behavioral therapy). Among these four types, interventions designed to address maladaptive social cognition were associated with the largest effect size (mean effect size = −.598).

These studies ranged from one with elderly adults from a nursing home in Tapei who participated in eight weekly sessions designed to increase awareness and expression of their feelings, to identify positive relationships from their past, and to apply these prior experiences to their current relationships ( Chiang et al., 2009 ) to one with high-risk Naval recruits at basic training who met for 45 minutes per week for 9 weeks to learn, discuss, and practice strategies for increasing one’s sense of belonging, decreasing thought distortion, and improving one’s coping and stress management ( Williams et al., 2004 ). Interventions designed to enhance social support produced a significant but small reduction in loneliness (mean effect size = −.162), while interventions to increase opportunities for social interaction (mean effect size = −.062, n.s.) and interventions to improve social skills (mean effect size = −.017, n.s.) were not found to be effective in lowering loneliness. These findings reinforce the notion that interpersonal contact or communication per se is not sufficient to address chronic loneliness in the general population.

One key to (social) cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) in the framework of reducing loneliness is to educate individuals to identify the automatic negative thoughts that they have about others and about social interactions more generally, and to regard these negative thoughts as possibly faulty hypotheses that need to be verified rather than as facts on which to act ( Anderson, Horowitz, & French, 1983 ; McWhirter, 1990a ; Young, 1982 ). By aiming to change maladaptive social perception and cognition (e.g., dysfunctional and irrational beliefs, false attributions, and self-defeating thoughts and interpersonal interactions; Young, 1982 ; for reviews: Cacioppo & Patrick, 2008 ; Masi et al., 2011 ; McWhirter, 1990a ), CBT approach implies that loneliness can be decreased ( Masi et al., 2011 , McWhirter, 1990a , for reviews).

Research on social cognition as a function of loneliness has resulted in the model depicted in Figure 2 . According to this model, lonely individuals typically do not voluntarily become lonely; rather, they “find themselves” on one edge of the continuum of social connections ( S. Cacioppo & Cacioppo, 2012 ) and feeling desperately isolated ( Booth, 2000 ). The perception that one is socially on the edge and isolated from others increases the motive for self-preservation. This, then, increases the motivation to connect with others but also increases an implicit hyper-vigilance for social threats, which then can introduce attentional, confirmatory, and memory biases. Given the effects of attention and expectation on anticipated social interactions, behavioral confirmation processes then can incline an individual who feels isolated to have or to place more import on negative social interactions, which if unchecked can reinforce withdrawal, negativity, and feelings of loneliness (e.g., see J. T. Cacioppo & Cacioppo, 2014 ; J. T. Cacioppo & Hawkley, 2009 ). This model points to a number of sources of dysfunctional and irrational beliefs, false expectations and attributions, and self-defeating thoughts and interpersonal interactions on which interventions might be designed to operate. For instance, the attentional, confirmatory, and memory biases could be targeted by training in perspective taking, empathy, and identifying automatic negative thoughts about others and about social interactions and in regarding these negative thoughts as possibly faulty hypotheses that need to be verified, whereas faulty behavioral confirmation processes could be targeted by training in mindfulness ( Baer, 2003 ; Creswell et al., 2012) and capitalization (sharing good times; Gable & Reis, 2010 ; Woods et al., 2014 ).

The effects of loneliness on social cognition. Modified from J. T. Cacioppo and Hawkley (2009) .

In sum, a primary criterion for empirically supported therapies is that they demonstrate efficacy in randomized controlled studies. Although more research is needed, the meta-analysis suggests that interventions designed to modify maladaptive social cognition may be especially worth pursuing. Such interventions can be expensive and time-consuming, and the client’s lack of openness to changing their thoughts about and interactions with others can be an obstacle to effective treatment. It is possible that these interventions may be more effective (or effective for a greater proportion of individuals) if augmented initially by an appropriate pharmacologic treatment.

Potential Adjunctive Pharmacological Treatments

To date, there is no adjunctive pharmacological treatment for loneliness, but animal research sheds promising light on this issue. For instance, research in which a social animal (e.g., prairie voles, titi monkeys) is chronically housed either with a preferred partner or alone has shown that isolation has deleterious neurological (see review by S. Cacioppo, Capitanio, & Cacioppo, 2014 ) and neuroendocrinological effects (see review by J. T. Cacioppo, Cacioppo, Capitanio, & Cole, 2015 ). Interestingly, animal research showed that the behavioral effects of social isolation could be improved with pharmacological help. For instance, pharmacological help includes administration of: 1) antidepressants of the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) class that have a broad range of effects including (but not restricted to) improving anxiety-like behavior and fear responses (fluoxetine; Pinna, 2010 ); 2) neurosteroids (such as allopregnanolone, ALLO) that activate the hypothalamic pituitary adrenocortical (HPA) axis, thereby facilitate the recovery of physiological homeostasis following stressful stimuli (e.g., Evans, Sun, McGregor, & Connor, 2012 ; cf. S. Cacioppo, Capitanio, & Cacioppo, 2014 ); or 3) oxytocin, a neuropeptide.

For instance, fluoxetine, an antidepressant of the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) class, has a broad range of effects including (but not restricted to) improving the behavioral effects of social isolation, anxiety-like behavior and fear responses ( Pinna, 2010 ; Mayo-Wilson et al., 2014 ). For patients who decline psychological interventions (such as CBT), SSRIs show consistent evidence of improvement. Interestingly, this improvement does not occur through the inhibition of selective serotonin reuptake (as in depression), but rather through elevated cortico-limbic levels of allopregnanolone (ALLO) and BDNF mRNA expression ( Pinna, 2010 ).

Research supporting the hypothesis of a crucial role of ALLO in social isolation demonstrates that: i) the exaggerated contextual fear response expressed by socially-isolated mice can be normalized with a single injection of ALLO ( Pibiri, Nelson, Guidotti, Costa, & Pinna, 2008 ); ii) HPA dysfunction and impairment of hippocampal neurogenesis respectively can be normalized or prevented with the administration of exogenous ALLO either during or following a period of chronic stress; iii) the establishment of depressive/anxiety-like behaviors in rats can be precluded also with administration of exogenous ALLO ( Evans et al., 2012 ; S. Cacioppo, Capitanio, & Cacioppo, 2014 ; Nelson & Pinna, 2011 ; Pinna, 2010 ); and iv) contextual fear conditioning and aggression can be regulated with ALLO ( Nelson & Pinna, 2011 ). Although further investigations of the effects of ALLO on social isolation are needed in humans, ALLO may provide an adjunctive therapeutic target early in cognitive behavioral interventions to alleviate chronic loneliness.

A third potential adjunctive pharmacological treatment for loneliness is oxytocin, a hypothalamic neuropeptide known to have a high sensitivity to social affiliation ( Carter et al., 2008 ; Goossens et al., in this issue; Grippo, 2009 ; Young et al., 2014 ). Recent work with prairie voles raises the possibility that oxytocin may help buffer the deleterious neural, behavioral, immune and autonomic effects of social isolation from a pair-bonded partner ( Grippo et al., 2009 ). The prairie vole is a monogamous rodent whose social structure has similarities to that of humans. In prairie voles, long-term social isolation from a mate or partner produces several negative behavioral and physiological alterations, including depressive and anxiety-relevant behaviors, and autonomic and cardiac dysfunction ( Grippo et al., 2007a – c , 2008 , 2011 , 2012 ; McNeal et al., 2014 ). The exogenous peripheral administration of oxytocin eliminates the adverse behavioral and autonomic changes associated with social isolation in the prairie vole ( Grippo et al., 2009 , 2012 ).

Oxytocin administration in humans has been shown to promote pro-social behaviors, affiliation, and trust ( Kosfeld et al., 2005 ), cooperation with others ( Declerck, Boone, & Kiyonari, 2014 ), social synchrony ( Arueti et al., 2013 ), autonomic cardiac control ( Norman, Cacioppo et al., 2011a ), and to decrease the emotional arousal in response to threatening human stimuli ( Norman, Cacioppo et al., 2011b ), but negative and inconsistent social effects have also been observed (see Bethlehem et al., 2014 , and Bali & Jaggi, 2014 , for reviews). For instance, some research studies suggest that oxytocin may make neurologically healthy individuals evaluate participants as more trusting and more pro-social in relaxed social situations and more aggressive in tense social situations (for review see: Bartz, Zaki, Bolger, & Ochsner, 2011 ), whereas others indicate that oxytocin administration increases outgroup aggression (e.g., De Dreu et al., 2010 ; Taylor et al., 2006 ). The fact that oxytocin has some prosocial effects, at least for some individuals or situations, is intriguing but how precisely oxytocin might prove helpful in the treatment of chronic loneliness requires additional research.

The etiology of loneliness and its consequences are complex. When the 1978 Task Panel report to the US President’s Commission on Mental Health emphasized the importance of improving health care and easing the pain of those suffering from loneliness, few would have thought that their recommendation would be even more relevant and important today. With increasing evidence that loneliness is a risk factor for mental and physical health problems, attention has begun to turn to interventions for addressing chronic loneliness.

As a first step, there is a need for increased public awareness – and awareness among healthcare providers – that loneliness is a condition that, like chronic pain, can become an affliction for almost anyone. Even popular and high status individuals can find themselves feeling lonely, and the stigma of loneliness further complicates assessment and treatment. Despite the fact that loneliness is a common emotional distress syndrome with a high risk factor for early mortality and a broad variety of physical health and psychiatric issues, it still gets little attention in medical training or in healthcare more generally.

In Masi et al.’s meta-analysis (2011) , we identified a need for well-controlled randomized studies focusing on the rehabilitation of the underlying maladaptive social cognition. With the advances made over the past 5 years in the identification of the psychobiological and pharmaceutical mechanisms associated with loneliness and maladaptive social cognition, it may soon be possible to combine (social) cognitive behavioral interventions with short-term adjunctive pharmacological treatments in order to reduce the prevalence of loneliness and its harmful consequences.

Acknowledgments

Preparation of this article was supported by the Department of the Army, Defense Medical Research and Development Program Grant No. W81XWH-11-2-0114.

1 Although significant overlaps exist between loneliness in adults and loneliness in children and adolescents (Qualter et al., in the present issue), we focus in the present article on reports involving adults.

2 To evaluate the three dimensions of loneliness, one typically uses the R-UCLA Loneliness scale (either the 20-item, 9-item or 3-item version; Russell et al., 1980 ; Hughes et al., 2004 ; Hawkley, Browne, & Cacioppo, 2005 ; Masi et al., 2011 ).

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International Conference on Mathematical Modeling and Computational Science

ICMMCS 2023: Proceedings of 3rd International Conference on Mathematical Modeling and Computational Science pp 359–369 Cite as

A Systematic Literature Review of How to Treat Cognitive Psychology with Artificial Intelligence

• Soobia Saeed 18 ,
• Manzoor Hussain 19 ,
• Mehmood Naqvi 20 &
• Kadim A. Jabbar 21  
• Conference paper
• First Online: 29 August 2023

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Part of the book series: Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing ((AISC,volume 1450))

The middle-of-the-road nowadays brain cognition is based on artificial intelligence however human subjective emotional and mental state changes cannot simulate the replication of biology. Currently, artificial intelligence does not meet all of our needs due to its limitations, this study's focus on the combination of cognitive psychology and artificial intelligence system would be the research trend of artificial intelligence. The aim of this research is to promote artificial intelligence development and cognitive psychology in terms of emotion, recognition, understanding of human behavior, empathy, and eventually conversion with human being and other artificial intelligence. This research emphasises the importance of possessing the understanding of artificial intelligence, human mental state discrimination, and two typical human interaction system including effective computing and face attraction which is further useful for higher levels of artificial intelligence research. This research also discusses how artificial intelligence is beneficial in the field of psychology and how machine learning techniques have been used to predict the developmental risks of mental health disorders and also detect the level of depression.

• Cognitive psychology
• Artificial intelligence
• Human–computer interaction
• Face attraction
• Affective computing

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Soobia Saeed

Computing Department, Faculty of Computing & Information Technology, Indus University, Karachi, Pakistan

Manzoor Hussain

School of Electronics Engineering and Computer Science, Mohwak College, Alberta, Canada

Mehmood Naqvi

College of Engineering, Medical Instruments Technology Engineering, National University of Science and Technology, Dhi Qar, Iraq

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Noor Zaman Jhanjhi

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Saeed, S., Hussain, M., Naqvi, M., Jabbar, K.A. (2023). A Systematic Literature Review of How to Treat Cognitive Psychology with Artificial Intelligence. In: Peng, SL., Jhanjhi, N.Z., Pal, S., Amsaad, F. (eds) Proceedings of 3rd International Conference on Mathematical Modeling and Computational Science. ICMMCS 2023. Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing, vol 1450. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-3611-3_29

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Don't forget that all the journal/scholarly articles you choose will be on the same topic. Do NOT choose magazine or newspaper articles for this assignment.

For more help finding scholarly journal articles with research, see Find Articles.  

For more help with APA references and in-text citations, see APA 7 Citation Help .

Best Databases for the Psychology Literature Review

How the Library Helps You Identify Types of Sources

Other Helpful Library Resources

• APA Citation Page Use this page to help you create references and in-text citations for APA 7.
• Finding Articles for Psychology, including those with Original Research Information on this page helps students find articles with original research and explains the sections of a scholarly journal article.

Finding Scholarly Articles in the Library's Database

What is a Literature Review

The literature review that you write summarizes and explains research that has been done on a particular topic. All of the articles will be on the same topic . You've seen literature reviews in academic articles that are written to show what's already been researched and why the authors choose to do their own research. Since you aren't actually conducting long, extensive research, you are are looking at a body of research and looking for common issues and also the progression of research (more sophisticated, taking new angles, etc.).

Content of the Review

Introduction.

The introduction explains the focus and establishes the importance of the subject. It discusses what kind of work has been done on the topic and identifies any controversies within the field or any recent research which has raised questions about earlier assumptions. It may provide background or history. It concludes with a purpose or thesis statement. This statement will sum up and evaluate the state of the art in this field of research.

Often divided by headings/subheadings, the body summarizes and evaluates the current state of knowledge in the field. It notes major themes or topics, the most important trends, and any findings about which researchers agree or disagree. 

The conclusion summarizes all the evidence presented and shows its significance.You should suggest any practical applications of the research as well as the implications and possibilities for future research.

How to Write A Literature Review

1. find a working topic.

Look at your textbook and Blackboard information. You should find a topic that's not too broad or too narrow. For example, developmental disabilities may be too broad but autism may be a better fit.

2. Review the Literature

• Use one of the psychology databases. 
• Remember that the reference lists of recent articles and reviews can lead to valuable papers
• Use the date slider bar to find older articles that might be considered "seminal" or the foundation for later studies.

3. Read the Selected Articles Thoroughly and Evaluate Them

• What assumptions do most/some researchers seem to be making?
• What methodologies do they use? what testing procedures, subjects, material tested?
• Evaluate and synthesize the research findings and conclusions drawn
• Note experts in the field: names/labs that are frequently referenced
• Watch for popularity of theories and how this has/has not changed over time

4. Develop a Working Thesis

Write a one or two sentence statement summarizing the conclusion you have reached about the major trends and developments you see in the research that has been done on your subject.

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