What are acceptable criteria to select publications for a (systematic) review? I'm in the very beginning of my scientific career, so I don't yet know the standards for (systematic) reviews very well. I feel I don't have so much experience that I could publish my own research in good journals (I have now just two conference papers), so I'm considering to pay close attention for 6-12 months in other peoples' works.

I have a clear research question, but given the massive amount of related papers it's difficult to choose which ones to pick. Of course, I will select papers related to my research question as the first criteria. However, could I narrow the range of included papers more by


publication date (e.g. only take papers published during the past five years),
impact factor or citation count,
type of publication (conference, journal),
sample size (e.g. number of subjects)?


Or, if not these, what criteria are commonly used? I guess the answer is different for reviews and systematic reviews, so please cover both if possible. thank you!

EDIT: I'm considering this so that it would be possible to try publish my results.
I do not find any of these points very relevant. The publication date couldbe useful if your topic is such that older references are indeeed obsolete.

To write a review you want to collect papers that describe your topic as well as possible. A review is usually a good point for others to see the depth and breadth of a subject so being complete is usually a sign of quality.

Given that you have a topic, you need to consider how you should organize your information. Is there any new that can come out of the way you organize your review? A review is not just a collection of older results, you need to provide a synthesis. Often the outcome is to made limitations in older work visible or to identify gaps in knowledge or point at directions for new development. Depending on what the purpose will be you may end up chosing papers differently. However, often you do not know the structure until you have read enough and come to realize how the knowledge in th earea is distributed.

So for me there is no real difference between review and systematic review. A review is simply a way to orgnaize and sort older information in a new way so that new patterns emerge and hint at directions for further research or other forms of new ideas.