Schick-Makaroff Kara, MacDonald Marjorie, Plummer Marilyn, Burgess Judy, Neander Wendy
Faculty of Nursing, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB, Canada.
School of Nursing, University of Victoria, Victoria, BC, Canada.
AIMS Public Health. 2016 Mar 30;3(1):172-215. doi: 10.3934/publichealth.2016.1.172. eCollection 2016.
When we began this process, we were doctoral students and a faculty member in a research methods course. As students, we were facing a review of the literature for our dissertations. We encountered several different ways of conducting a review but were unable to locate any resources that synthesized all of the various synthesis methodologies. Our purpose is to present a comprehensive overview and assessment of the main approaches to research synthesis. We use 'research synthesis' as a broad overarching term to describe various approaches to combining, integrating, and synthesizing research findings.
We conducted an integrative review of the literature to explore the historical, contextual, and evolving nature of research synthesis. We searched five databases, reviewed websites of key organizations, hand-searched several journals, and examined relevant texts from the reference lists of the documents we had already obtained.
We identified four broad categories of research synthesis methodology including conventional, quantitative, qualitative, and emerging syntheses. Each of the broad categories was compared to the others on the following: key characteristics, purpose, method, product, context, underlying assumptions, unit of analysis, strengths and limitations, and when to use each approach.
The current state of research synthesis reflects significant advancements in emerging synthesis studies that integrate diverse data types and sources. New approaches to research synthesis provide a much broader range of review alternatives available to health and social science students and researchers.
当我们开始这个过程时，我们是博士生以及一门研究方法课程的教员。作为学生，我们正面临着为我们的博士论文进行文献综述的任务。我们遇到了几种不同的进行综述的方法，但却找不到任何综合了所有不同综合方法的资源。我们的目的是对研究综合的主要方法进行全面的概述和评估。我们使用“研究综合”这个宽泛的总体术语来描述结合、整合和综合研究结果的各种方法。
我们对文献进行了综合综述，以探究研究综合的历史、背景和不断演变的性质。我们搜索了五个数据库，查阅了关键组织的网站，人工检索了几本期刊，并检查了我们已获取文献的参考文献列表中的相关文本。
我们确定了研究综合方法的四大类，包括传统综合、定量综合、定性综合和新兴综合。对每一大类在以下方面进行了相互比较：关键特征、目的、方法、成果、背景、潜在假设、分析单位、优势和局限性，以及每种方法的适用时机。
研究综合的当前状态反映了新兴综合研究的重大进展，这些研究整合了不同的数据类型和来源。新的研究综合方法为健康和社会科学领域的学生及研究人员提供了范围更广的综述选择。
