Library Guides: Scoping Reviews: Define the question

Define the question

Although the focus of scoping reviews is often broad, a clearly constructed question is still necessary.

The Joanna Briggs Institute recommends the use of the PCC framework for scoping reviews, although other frameworks can also be used depending on the nature of the review. More detailed information about developing a question for a scoping review is available in the scoping review chapter of the JBI Manual for Evidence Synthesis.

Using these types of frameworks to break down the question into discrete components can help formulate a good answerable question and also helps in the development of a search strategy. Well-formulated review questions use structured formats to improve the scientific rigor.

Some of these models and frameworks, including PCC are shown below.

Type of research question	Models	Disciplines
Clinical questions	PICO Variants - PIO, PICOT, PICOS	Health
Quantitative	PICO & variants PIO, PICOT, PICOS PIFT	Health; Social Sciences Business & Policy; Environment; Ecology
Qualitative	PEO, PICo CLIP, ECLIPSE	Social Sciences Management
Mixed Methods (use for either qualitative or quantitative)	PCC SPICE SPIDER FINER	Health Social Sciences
Methodology or theory	BeHEMoTH SDMO	Health

Further reading:

Munn, Z., Stern, C., Aromataris, E., Lockwood, C., & Jordan, Z. (2018). What kind of systematic review should I conduct? A proposed typology and guidance for systematic reviewers in the medical and health sciences. BMC Medical Research Methodology, 18, 5. http://doi.org/10.1186/s12874-017-0468-4

Frameworks for research questions
This list of from the University of Maryland provides more models and frameworks across many different disciplines.

Models and frameworks

PCC< SPICE, SPIDER and FINER are models that can be used for both qualitative and quantitative topics.

PCC
Population	Important characteristics of participants, including age and other qualifying criteria.
Concept	Use the ideas from your primary questions to determine your concept. The core concept examined by the scoping review should be clearly articulated to guide the scope and breadth of the inquiry. This may include details that pertain to elements that would be detailed in a standard systematic review, such as the "interventions" and/or "phenomena of interest" and/or "outcomes".
Context	May include... cultural factors such as geographic location and/or specific racial or gender-based interests. In some cases, context may also encompass details about the specific setting
Source: *Aromataris E, Munn Z (Editors). (2020). JBI manual for evidence synthesis. Joanna Briggs Institute. https://doi.org/10.46658/JBIMES-20-01* See Example

FINER
Feasibility	What is the feasibility? Focuses on time, scope, resources, expertise, and funding
Interesting	What is the intrinsic and extrinsic interest in answering a research question?
Novel	How does it generate new evidence for the current empirical literature?
Ethical	What are the ethical implications?
Relevant	What is the clinical relevance of a research question?
Source: *Cummings, S. R., Browner, W. S., & Hulley, S. B. (1988) Conceiving the research question. In S. B. Hulley, & S. R. Cummings SR (Eds), Designing Clinical Research.* (pp. 12 - 17). Williams & Wilkins**

SPICE
Setting	Where is the study being undertaken?
Perspective	For whom? Who are the targets or participants of the study?
Intervention	What is the change or intervention being studied?
Comparison	What is the intervention being compared to?
Evaluation	With what result? How is the result being measured?
Source: Booth, A. (2006). Clear and present questions: Formulating questions for evidence based practice. Library Hi Tech, 24(3), 355-368. https://doi.org/10.1108/07378830610692127 See Example

SPIDER
Sample	The group of people being looked at
Phenomenon of Interest	Looks at the reasons for behaviour and decisions, rather than an intervention.
Design	The form of research used, such as interview or survey.
Evaluation	The outcome measures.
Research type	Type of research. e.g. qualitative, quantitative or mixed method
Source: *Cooke, A., Smith, D., & Booth, A. (2012). Beyond PICO: The SPIDER tool for qualitative evidence synthesis. Qualitative Health Research, 22(10), 1435-1443. https://doi.org/10.1177/1049732312452938* See Example

The PICO model is a tool widely used to develop answerable questions.

Population, Patient or Problem	Who are the people being studied or What is the problem being looked at? What are their characteristics?
Intervention	What is the treatment or intervention being studied? (treat, diagnose, observe)
Comparison, Control or Comparator	What is the intervention compared to? (e.g. other interventions, standard treatment, no treatment) This can be optional if no comparison applies.
Outcome	What are the relevant outcomes and how are they measured?

Chapter 5 of the Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions has more information on the defining each element of the PICO acronym.

Variants of PICO

PIO

Use when there is no Comparison, Control or Comparator

PICOT

Includes Time from the intervention that outcomes are measured.

PICOS

Includes Study Design e.g. cohorts or randomized controlled trials.

Examples

Question:

Does the use of chlorhexidine mouthwash prevent gingivitis and aid in plaque control?

Question:

Do first year students who attend the library Orientation week sessions perform better on research assessment than non-attending students?

Patient, population or problem	gingivitis and plaque control	Patient, population or problem	first year university students
Intervention	use of chlorhexidine mouthwash	Intervention	attendance of library orientation sessions
Comparison	those who do not use chlorhexidine mouthwash	Comparison	non-attending students
Outcome	decreased gingivitis and increased plaque control	Outcome	good assessment results

Instructional Videos

Tutorial from the Cushing/Whitney Medical Library

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Tutorial from QUT

The variants of PICO below are adapted to work better with qualitative studies.

PEO

PICo

Population and their problems

Who are the users, patients or community being affected? What are their symptoms, age, gender etc.

Population

What are the characteristics of the population or patient? What condition or disease are you interested in?

Exposure

Use for a specific exposure (this term is used loosely) such as “witnessed resuscitation” or “domestic violence”

Interest

The phenomena of interest, related to a defined event, activity, experience or process

Outcomes or themes

Are you looking for improvements in pain, responsiveness to treatment, mobility, quality of life, daily living? Usually there will be an element of looking at patient’s experiences.

Context

The setting or distinct characteristics

Source:

Moola, S., Munn, Z., Sears, K., Sfetcu, R., Currie, M., Lisy, K., . . . Mu, P. (2015). Conducting systematic reviews of association (etiology): The Joanna Briggs Institute's approach. International Journal of Evidence-Based Healthcare, 13(3), 163-169. https://doi.org/10.1097/XEB.0000000000000064

Source:

Lockwood, C., Munn, Z., & Porritt, K. (2015). Qualitative research synthesis: Methodological guidance for systematic reviewers utilizing meta-aggregation. International Journal of Evidence-Based Healthcare, 13(3), 179-187. https://doi.org/10.1097/XEB.0000000000000062

CLIP & ECLIPSE are other types of question frameworks for qualitative studies

CLIP

ECLIPSE

Client group	At whom is the service aimed?	Expectation	What do you want the information for (the original ‘I’s)?
Location	Where is the service sited?	Client group	At whom is the service aimed?
Improvement or Information or Innovation	What do you want to find out?	Location	Where is the service sited?
Professionals	who is involved in providing/improving the service?	Impact	What is the change in the service, if any, which is being looked for? What would constitute success? How is this being measured?
		Professionals	Who is involved in providing/improving the service?
		Service	Which service are you looking for information? For example, outpatient services, nurse‐led clinics, intermediate care.

Source:

Wildridge, V., & Bell, L. (2002). How CLIP became ECLIPSE: A mnemonic to assist in searching for health policy/management information. Health Information and Libraries Journal, 19(2), 113-115. https://doi.org/10.1046/j.1471-1842.2002.00378.x

See Example

PICO

PIFT

P	Population, Problem or Patient	Product or Process	What is the product or process category being assessed?
I	Intervention	Impacts	What are the impact(s) of interest?
C	Comparison, Control or Comparator	Flows	What are the flow(s) or economic sectors contributing to the impact?
O	Outcome	Types	What are the types of Life Cycle Assessment of interest?

Taken from:

Zumsteg, J. M., Cooper, J. S., & Noon, M. S. (2012). Systematic review checklist: A standardized technique for assessing and reporting reviews of life cycle assessment data. Designing Journal of Industrial Ecology, 16 (S1), S12-S21. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1530-9290.2012.00476.x

BeHEMoTh

SDMO

Be	Behaviour of interest	S	Types of studies
H	Health context	D	Types of Data
E	Exclusions	M	Types of Methods
MoTh	Models or Theories	O	Types of Outcome measures

Taken from:

Booth, C., & Carroll, C. (2015). Systematic searching for theory to inform systematic reviews: is it feasible? Is it desirable? Health Information & Libraries Journal, 32(3), 220-235. https://doi.org/10.1111/hir.12108

Taken from:

Clarke, M., Oxman, A. D., Paulsen, E., Higgins, J. P., Green, S. (2011). Appendix A: Guide to the contents of a Cochrane Methodology protocol and review. In: J. P. Higgins & S. Green (Eds.). Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions (Version 5.1.0). The Cochrane Collaboration.
https://training.cochrane.org/handbook/archive/v5.1/

Scoping Reviews

Define the question

Type of research question

Models

Disciplines

Clinical questions

Quantitative

Qualitative

Mixed Methods (use for either qualitative or quantitative)

Methodology or theory

Models and frameworks

PCC

Population

Concept

Context

Source:

See Example

FINER

Feasibility

Interesting

Novel

Ethical

Relevant

Source:

SPICE

Setting

Perspective

Intervention

Comparison

Evaluation

Source:

See Example

SPIDER

Sample

Phenomenon of Interest

Design

Evaluation

Research type

Source:

See Example

Population, Patient or Problem

Intervention

Comparison, Control or Comparator

Outcome

PIO

PICOT

PICOS

Question:

Does the use of chlorhexidine mouthwash prevent gingivitis and aid in plaque control?

Question:

Do first year students who attend the library Orientation week sessions perform better on research assessment than non-attending students?

Patient, population or problem

Patient, population or problem

Intervention

Intervention

Comparison

Comparison

Outcome

Outcome

PEO

PICo

Population and their problems

Population

Exposure

Interest

Outcomes or themes

Context

Source:

Source:

CLIP

ECLIPSE

Client group

Expectation

Location

Client group

Improvement or Information or Innovation

Location

Professionals

Impact

Professionals

Mixed Methods
(use for either qualitative
or quantitative)

Improvement or Information or
Innovation