Q: In my systematic review, should I describe my research method as qualitative or mixed?
In my systematic review, I used some quantitative journal articles for literature references, but am not going to evaluate the calculations on those. In this case, should I describe my research method as qualitative or mixed?
It seems you plan to use those articles to write the background and provide the context for the review. So, as long as you don’t statistically combine the data from those articles (or evaluate the calculations on those, as you mentioned), you can describe your method and the overall review as qualitative. If however you do combine the data, you will need to describe the method as mixed. You will need to do this in the Methods section, when writing about the inclusion and exclusion criteria. Also, be sure to mention all references (quantitative and qualitative) in the References section.
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