Table 3.

Criteria used for assessing the conceptual richness of sources

‘Conceptually rich’	Explanatory but not ‘conceptually rich’	Descriptive
Theoretical concepts are unambiguous and described in sufficient depth to be useful	Consideration of the context in which the research took place	Limited or no consideration of the context in which the research took place
Relationships between and among concepts are clearly articulated	Some attempt to explain anomalous results and findings with reference to context and data	No attempt to explain anomalous results and findings with reference to context and data
Concepts sufficiently developed and defined to enable understanding without the reader needing to have first-hand experience of an area of practice	Correlations and relationships explained, with use of inferential statistics (quantitative studies)	Use of descriptive statistics only (quantitative studies)
Concepts grounded strongly in a cited body of literature
Concepts are parsimonious (i.e. provide the simplest, but not over-simplified, explanation)