Domestic Research Trends of Social Learning in Higher Education

Abstract The purpose of this study was to analyze domestic research trends of social learning in higher education, and find out educational implications with regard to the effectiveness of social learning. The 63 articles on social learning were finally analyzed, which were published in KCI journals. The results are as follows: Firstly, in respect of research contents, the research area of utilization and the survey methods were most frequently used in those studies. Secondly, as to the use of SNS, the analyzed studies were centralized on Facebook and Formal Structured Learning. Thirdly, as for the effectiveness of SNS, the experimental studies showed that social learning has an effective impact on the learning outcomes, learning processes, and learners' characteristics. In addition, survey studies most frequently set the independent variables as learners' characteristics and the dependent variables as participation, satisfaction, and academic achievement. This research has a significance in terms of verifying the educational implications of social learning, and providing the preliminary data to facilitate the performance for the effective social learning.