Table 2 The criteria used for the extraction of information from the selected articles
From: Research progress on world natural heritage conservation: its buffer zones and the implications
Criteria | Categories considered | Justification |
|---|---|---|
Annual distribution | Year of publication | To investigate the earliest stages of research and most published articles |
Distribution of regions and institutions | Country and institution of the first author | To examine the most published continents and institutions to reveal key research strengths |
Classification and content of the literature | Research themes (By keywords and abstract reading) | To discover the main research areas and frontiers |
Main process and landmark achievements | Theory, methodology, techniques, research focus, research findings (By main body skim reading) | To distil the progress and content of existing studies to support comparative analysis |
Implications for future research | Research gaps (By comparative study) | To identify gaps in the existing study and find breakthroughs for future research |