Museums & Cultural Heritage via social media: an integrated literature review

Museums are increasingly using social media to include newer active experiences and entertainment. Not only does this digital shift provide cost-effective, targeted and direct communication with the audience, but it also expands the museum experience beyond the borders of time and place. Although social media has triggered the attention of scholars, no previous study has classified the main ways in which social media affect museums. Drawing on a review of 54 papers this paper both categorizes and presents four major effects. The first effect relates to the opportunities of social media to museum experience and communication. The second effect is the social media enhancement to museums’ learning process. The third effect analyses patterns of social media use in museums. The fourth effect involves both the problems and the barriers attendant to social media integration in museums. This study contributes by presenting new theoretical insights, research topics, and managerial implications