TRENDS AND PATTERNS IN SOCIAL MEDIA AND ECOTOURISM RESEARCH: A BIBLIOMETRIC ANALYSIS

Abstract

The main aim of this study to conduct a bibliometric analysis and to identify the publication trends, major contributions, thematic structures and future directions in field of social media and ecotourism. Between 2011 and 2025, 301 publications were gathered from Scopus database on social media and ecotourism have been identified.The VOSviewer and the R softwares were utilised for all the analyses. According to the results, the number of studies in this domain has grown over the previous few years. Also, the results co-occurrences analysis revealed that social media and its impact on ecotourism have continued to be the primary areas of study. This study may create a base for the emerging topic of social media and ecotourism by evaluating pertinent articles, allowing future scholars to analyse the usage and advantages of social media in ecotourism. This study will help the academicians and researchers to understand the gaps in the existing literature and prospective study paths, which would help them perform future investigations. The analysis results add to a comprehensive knowledge of social media and ecotourism research development. The findings further indicate that Sustainability (Switzerland), the Journal of Sustainable Tourism and the Journal of Outdoor Recreation and Tourism are the leading outlets in this domain, while China, Australia and the United States emerge as the most productive contributing countries. Bibliographic coupling, citation and co-citation analyses further map the intellectual foundations of the field and identify the authors, countries and sources that anchor its scholarly conversation. The thematic map distinguishes motor, basic, niche and emerging themes, with tourist behaviour, sustainable tourism development and the tourism industry emerging as the most promising directions for future enquiry.