Matching a Research Question to a Review Method

With so many review types available, researchers are overwhelmed with options. This webinar will enable you to assist researchers in determining if a research question can be answered with a review and, if it can, which type of review best addresses the question. Through practical advice and case studies, you’ll learn how to recognize what can be done as a systematic review and when a different methodology, such as a narrative, scoping, integrative, mapping, or realist review should be pursued.

This webinar is required for the Level II of the Systematic Review Services Specialization.

Learning Outcomes

By the end of this webinar, participants will be able to:

• Define the differences and similarities among systematic reviews, narrative reviews, scoping reviews, integrative reviews, mapping reviews, realist reviews, and meta-analyses.
• List steps to determine the feasibility of a research question to be answered by conducting a systematic review
• Describe techniques to get the most out of the initial meetings with clients
• Describe how to frame questions
• List potential tools and resources to support selecting review methods

Audience

Medical librarians and other information professionals who consult or collaborate on reviews or teach review methods.

Presenters:

Margaret J. Foster, MS, MPH, AHIP, is the Evidence Synthesis and Scholarly Communication Librarian and the Director of the Center for Systematic Reviews and Research Syntheses at the Medical Sciences Library, Texas A&M University. She has nearly two decades of experience collaborating on and publishing reviews in medicine, public health, veterinary medicine, education, agriculture, engineering, and other fields. She is the co-author of the first book on systematic reviews for librarians, Assembling the Pieces of a Systematic Review: A Guide for Librarians (2017), and of the recent revision of that book, Piecing Together Systematic Reviews and Other Evidence Syntheses (2022).

Traci J. Mays, is an assistant librarian at Florida Gulf Coast University and serves as the evidence synthesis co-coordinator for the university. She has been conducting systematic reviews since 2014.

MLA CE: 1.5