Museums are undergoing changes as institutions which may cause them to adopt a more community and social mission oriented course of programs in addition to their traditional roles of scholarship and preservation of important artifacts. This change, coupled with the fact that museum visitation is a highly social activity, raises some interesting possibilities for evaluation of learning in non-traditional environments. It also calls for an emphasis on the social learning basis behind the use of institutions like museums. To facilitate the awareness of these social learning potentials more information is needed on museums as institutions: how they reach and develop their audiences, the social nature of museum visiting, and socially based learning criteria for museum settings. In addition, innovative strategies in evaluation and some kind of theoretical framework are needed. (Author)