Literature Review

This is the second section of the assignment below are the topic and intervention for part one. Then you have the instructions for this week’s discussion.

Topic: Obesity among children

Intervention: The suggested research is the Family-based intervention. Early data indicates that family-based programs to reduce childhood obesity are beneficial in promoting short- and long-term weight loss (Berge & Everts, 2011). As I previously stated, children’s dietary preferences are greatly influenced by the meals they are exposed to at home. The program will strongly emphasize informing parents about the effects of obesity and their part in addressing this public health concern. Also, the intervention will provide the parents with the needed information and tools to build a healthy environment that promotes kids to make better dietary choices, explore new foods, and get the recommended amount of daily physical exercise. Moreover, parents will be educated on the best food-related parenting practices that make eating from kids enjoyable and peaceful instead of stressful for both children and parents.

  • Instructions for this assignment: In this discussion, you will provide a critical review of the literature on your chosen topic. A good literature review is not simply a descriptive list or set of summaries of the available research. The literature review should provide a coherent, well-organized analysis. A meaningful review of the literature should do the following:
  • Be organized around and related directly to your research topic.
  • Synthesize results into a critical review of what is and is not known or believed about the topic.
  • Identify a gap in the literature.
  • Identify areas of controversy in the literature.
  • Formulate questions that need further research.
  • Remember that reading research literature is important in identifying a problem that is academically credible. If the problem in which you are interested is not discussed in the academic literature, there is a strong possibility that you are not defining the problem in a manner that will allow you to connect it to previous studies. Knowing how to access the existing literature is, therefore, a critical early step in research.

Step 1

Review the assigned readings and search the literature databases of the University of Arizona and other sources. Identify at least five peer-reviewed articles on public health interventions published in the past five years that relate to your chosen topic.

In your discussion post, include the following:

  • In approximately 500 words, write a literature review that summarizes the five most relevant articles on public health interventions that you found on your topic. This section should address the following:
    • Include a brief statement of how each of your articles relates to your chosen topic. Discuss how each article helps you to refine or clarify your topic.
    • What have researchers said about your research topic?
    • What research approaches and methodologies were used? Why?
    • What aspects of your research topic seem to have been studied the most? What aspects seem to have been studied the least?
    • Provide one to two research questions and up to three research objectives that arise from your review of the literature. In particular, identify potential “gaps” in the studies you found that may lead to a problem or question you might investigate. Clearly delineate how studying your problem may help advance practice in the field.
  • Include a review of methods and methodological approaches used to study the topic, in which you should:
    • Examine the theoretical perspectives, paradigms, and study populations in the research literature you reviewed.
    • Critically analyze the methodological approaches used in previous research on your chosen topic.

Hint: Your literature review will form the background for your research proposal. See here for a research article with a great literature review/background section on overweight/obesity intervention. The article is for illustration purposes only. I expect you to come up with an innovative research topic and intervention based on your interest and robust literature search.

Include references to all sources in APA format.