An Alternative Method of Literature Review: Systematic Review in English Language Teaching Research

摘要

Literature review in education in general, and in English language teaching (ELT) in particular, suffers from pitfalls such as, insufficient academic training, lack of explicit methodology, and lack of assessment of trustworthiness of the evidence. The present study has embarked on introducing the elements, advantages, and steps of systematic research synthesis as a more rigorous, more structured, and stricter methodology for reviewing the previous research. The method, having overwhelmed health and social sciences for several decades, has already penetrated ELT research initiated by the Evidence for Policy and Practice Information and Coordinating (EPPI) Center in England. ELT research synthesis, like the type of synthesis conducted in high quality health and social sciences research, is expected to be explicit, transparent, replicable, accountable, and potentially updatable.