How to Write an RRL (Review of Related Literature)

If your professor handed back a chapter marked "this is a summary, not a review," you are not alone. The Review of Related Literature is the chapter most students rewrite the most times, because it is the one chapter that asks you to do something you have never been taught to do: argue with sources instead of listing them.

This guide covers the RRL as it is actually assigned in Philippine, Indian and Southeast Asian universities — Chapter 2 of the standard five-chapter thesis format — and the equivalent literature review chapter used in US and UK programs. Same skill, different name.

What an RRL actually is

RRL stands for Review of Related Literature. In the five-chapter thesis format used across most Philippine and Indian universities, it is Chapter 2, sitting between your problem statement (Chapter 1) and your methodology (Chapter 3).

Its job is narrow and specific: prove that your research question has not already been answered, and that it is worth answering. Everything else is decoration.

Related Literature vs. Related Studies

Many local formats split Chapter 2 into two parts, and students routinely mix them up:

Both are usually split again into local (your own country) and foreign. If your program requires that split, respect it — panels check for it.

The structure that passes review

Do not organise your RRL by author. Organise it by theme. This single change is the difference between a summary and a review.

1. Introduction to the chapter — one short paragraph. State what themes you will cover and in what order. Three to five sentences is plenty.
2. Theme 1, Theme 2, Theme 3… — each theme gets its own subheading. Inside each theme, discuss multiple studies together. A theme with one citation is not a theme.
3. Synthesis — pull the themes together. What is the overall state of knowledge? Where do researchers agree? Where do they conflict?
4. Research gap — the most important paragraph in the chapter. Name precisely what has not been studied, and connect it directly to your research question.
5. Theoretical / conceptual framework — if your program puts it in Chapter 2, it goes last, built from the theories you just reviewed.

How many sources do you need?

Check your own program's handbook — these are norms, not rules. Most programs also ask that the majority of sources be from the last five years, with older work allowed only for foundational theory.

Summary vs. synthesis, shown side by side

This is the part worth reading twice. Both passages below use the same three sources.

Notice what the second version does: it groups, it contrasts, it explains why findings differ, and its last sentence hands you the research gap. That final move is what the panel is looking for.

Sentence patterns that do the work

Synthesis is largely a matter of having the right connective phrases available. Keep these handy:

Where to find sources that a panel will accept

Panels reject blog posts, Wikipedia and commercial websites. Use these instead:

• Google Scholar — start here. Use the "Cited by" link to walk forward in time from a key paper, and the year filter to enforce your recency requirement.
• Your university library's database — almost every institution pays for JSTOR, EBSCO, ProQuest or ScienceDirect. Log in through the library portal, not the public site.
• DOAJ (Directory of Open Access Journals) — peer-reviewed and free.
• Semantic Scholar — good for tracing citation chains.
• Your own university's thesis repository — the fastest source of local studies, and the one students forget.

Build a literature matrix before you write

Students who skip this step are the ones who end up writing summaries, because a pile of PDFs has no structure to synthesise. A matrix gives you one.

Make a spreadsheet with one row per source:

Now sort by the Theme column. Your subheadings write themselves, and the Limitation column — read down the page — is your research gap in raw form.

Citing correctly in APA 7

Most thesis programs in the region use APA 7. Two patterns cover nearly everything in an RRL:

• Narrative — when the researcher is the subject of your sentence: Santos (2021) argued that…
• Parenthetical — when the finding matters more than who found it: Engagement declined sharply during the shift to remote learning (Santos, 2021).

For synthesis you will often cite several sources at once. In APA 7, order them alphabetically inside the brackets and separate with semicolons: (Cruz, 2023; Reyes, 2022; Santos, 2021). Three or more authors use "et al." from the first citation onward: (Santos et al., 2021).

Seven mistakes that get chapters returned

1. Organising by author. One paragraph per source, in the order you read them. Reorganise by theme.
2. No research gap. The chapter ends after the last study with no statement of what is missing. The gap is the point of the chapter.
3. Sources that are too old. If most of your citations predate the last five years, the panel will ask whether the field has moved on.
4. Reviewing sources you never open. Citing from an abstract, or worse from another paper's description of a study, is how factual errors enter your chapter. Panels catch this.
5. No local studies. If your program's format asks for local and foreign, an all-foreign review reads as incomplete.
6. Copying phrasing. Paraphrasing that keeps the original sentence structure is still plagiarism. Read, close the PDF, then write from your notes.
7. Reviewing everything. An RRL is not a field survey. If a study does not bear on your specific question, leave it out.

A workflow that finishes the chapter

1. Fix your question first. You cannot judge whether a source is "related" until you know exactly what you are asking — see writing an arguable claim.
2. Gather 1.5× what you need. Aiming for 30 sources? Collect 45. You will discard a third once you read properly.
3. Fill the matrix as you read. Not after. One row per source, immediately.
4. Sort by theme and count. Themes with fewer than three sources either need more reading or should merge into another theme.
5. Draft one theme at a time. Each theme section: what the studies collectively show → where they differ → what that means for your question.
6. Write the gap last. Read the Limitation column top to bottom. The pattern you see there is your gap.
7. Check every citation against the reference list. Mismatches between in-text citations and the reference list are the most common formatting failure.

Where AI genuinely helps — and where it will get you in trouble

Let us be direct about this, because the honest answer is more useful than a sales pitch.

The rule that keeps you safe: use AI on sources you already have. Never use it to find sources without verifying every one of them in Google Scholar or your library database first.

This is the specific reason ASimplify's literature review tool works from sources you supply and returns a citation you can click through to the real record, rather than generating references from a prompt. The verification step is not optional, and a tool that hides it is doing you harm.

Before you submit

• Chapter is organised by theme, not by author
• Every theme section discusses at least three sources together
• Agreements and contradictions between studies are stated explicitly
• A research gap is named in plain language and links to your research question
• Local and foreign studies are both present, if your format requires it
• Majority of sources published within the last five years
• Every in-text citation appears in the reference list, and vice versa
• Every source cited has actually been opened and read
• Reference list is alphabetised and formatted in one consistent style