Social media and professional development: a systematic review

Abstract

The great popularisation of social media at the beginning of the 21st century has led to the production of many empirical studies in an attempt to explore the opportunities these platforms provide for different activities, such as learning and updating for professionals. This study aims to identify and summarise the main characteristics of research into social media and professional development published between 2013 and 2017. We analysed the years, journals, conceptual background, research methodologies, data collection tools, professional disciplines, educational contexts, types of social media and characteristics of social media that can generate learning opportunities. A total of 44 articles were selected and analysed from peer-reviewed journals. Findings revealed that (1) an upward trend with respect to research on social media and professional development; (2) surveys were the main research method for collecting data about social media; (3) health and education sciences are the most studied fields of knowledge; (4) there is a special interest in the study of social media in informal learning contexts; (5) Twitter is the most studied social media platform and (6) social media seems to be a sustainable support for professional development due to its open, social and flexible nature. Implications of findings for future research are also discussed.

A tale of two subreddits: Change and continuity in teaching‐related online spaces

“…We used the learning ecologies and affinity spaces concepts jointly to frame our investigation of educators’ SDL on Reddit. Prior studies on educators’ voluntary use of social media have also used learning ecologies (Peters & Romero, 2019; Stevenson, Bower, Falloon, Forbes, & Hatzigianni, 2019; Veletsianos et al ., 2019) and affinity spaces framings (Bruguera et al ., 2019; Greenhalgh, Rosenberg, Staudt Willet, Koehler, & Akcaoglu, 2020; Staudt Willet & Carpenter, 2020), but this paper uniquely combines the two.…”

“…These platforms create opportunities to build relationships, develop networks and communities, and gain vital emotional support, which can reduce feelings of professional isolation (Carpenter & Krutka, 2015; Macià & García, 2016). Unlike PD that is scheduled months in advance and can be quite expensive (eg, conferences), social media can facilitate free and just‐in‐time learning (Bruguera et al ., 2019). The value of such on‐demand support has been underscored recently as the COVID‐19 pandemic has required educators to navigate dramatic shifts in their work (Trust, Carpenter, Krutka, & Kimmons, 2020).…”

“…As of September 2020, multiple teaching‐related subreddits had thousands of subscribers. Despite such subreddits’ existence, Reddit has received scant attention from researchers when compared to other online platforms used by teachers for SDL (Bruguera et al ., 2019). We identified only four prior studies exploring teaching and learning on Reddit.…”

“…The body of research covering educators’ uses of social media for professional learning has been growing. However, past work has focused on some platforms (eg, Twitter, Facebook), while paying relatively scant attention to others (eg, Instagram, Reddit) and has included only limited exploration of many relevant topics (Bruguera, Guitert, & Romeu, 2019; Lantz‐Andersson, Lundin, & Selwyn, 2018; Veletsianos, Johnson, & Belikov, 2019).…”

Scientific Mapping of Social Media in Education: A Decade of Exponential Growth

“…So far, a few studies have scientifically mapped the use of social media in education. They are either focusing on one platform such as Twitter (e.g., Malik, Heyman-Schrum, & Johri, 2019) and Facebook (e.g., Manca & Ranieri, 2013, 2016, or on social media in general but within a specific subfield of education (e.g., Bruguera et al, 2019;Reinhardt, 2019;Sterling et al, 2017). Other reviews zeroed in on one platform only within a specific subfield of education (e.g., Barrot, 2018;Coleman & O'Connor, 2019;Nagle, 2018).…”