Methodological Innovations, Ahead of Print.
The reasons driving users to flag/report online hate and social media mis/disinformation in Africa—or, conversely, why they choose not to. We conducted surveys with social media users in several African countries to gauge their definitional understandings of online hate and mis/disinformation; their awareness of content moderation processes, including the role of artificial intelligence (AI); and their engagement with flagging/reporting online content. The challenge, however, was how to conduct survey research in difficult-to-reach places, some of which are affected by violent conflict, and within a limited budget. Given that our aim was to reach social media users, we used Facebook to advertise our survey, drawing on the breadth of research on using the platform as a research tool and the fact it has a large user base in the targeted countries. In this article, we explore the practicalities, challenges, and limitations of Facebook as a tool for survey research in African countries.