Delivering Research into Australian User Experience with Control Features on Social Media Services and Dating Platforms

The proposed response to the RFQ addresses a pressing research gap and will generate substantial new knowledge on Australians’ understanding, awareness and use of control and safety features on social media and digital dating platforms. This project is designed specifically to generate direct and workable evidence for government policy makers, digital platforms and members of the public. It will examine Australians’ use of social media services and digital dating platforms, and in particular, their engagement with user control features (e.g. safety tools) for preventing, reporting, and responding to online harm, and measure their perceptions of the effectiveness of these features. As our previous research has demonstrated, a better understanding of how these features and tools are understood and used is vital for all Australians, but especially for vulnerable populations including women (Flynn et al., 2022; Harris & Woodlock, 2021), First Nations people (Flynn et al., 2022), LGBTQIA+ people (Byron et al., 2019; Nelson et al., 2021) and culturally and linguistically diverse communities (Henry et al., 2022). These groups experience harm, harassment, and violence at greater rates than the general population, and their voices and experiences are vital in understanding the role of safety control features and how they can be improved.