Integrative review of social presence in distance education: Issues and challenges

The purpose of this review is to provide an overview of the evolution of social presence research in the field of distance education and identified problems in investigating this construct. The researchers took an integrative review on existing social presence studies to answer three questions: (a) How definitions of social presence evolved since its establishment (b) How research focus shifted (c) What problems exist in social presence measurement. A total of 189 empirical studies in the area of distance education from 1976 to 2013 were selected and reviewed. The results of the study suggested that social presence was still illusive and difficult to define. Moreover, because of its ambiguity, many doubts and problems were identified in measuring social presence. Lastly, this review specified the limitations of similar studies, and provided guidance for future investigations.