Mobile Myanmar: The Impact of Social Media on Young People Living in Conflict-Affected Regions of Myanmar KEY INFORMANT INTERVIEWS: RESULTS This section presents a summary of the qualitative analysis of the 38 one-on-one KIIs conducted in Kayah and Rakhine State with young people and adults ranging in age from 18-55 years, including representation from teachers, parents and community leaders. The KII data from both states were analysed together due to the smaller overall sample size and more consistent interview format compared to the FGDs. There was 19 KIIs conducted in Kayah State (8 urbanbased and 11 rural-based) and 19 in Rakhine State (8 urban-based and 11 IDP camp-based). Rural villages in Rakhine State were not sampled due to resource constraints, with priority given to urban Muslim IDP camps. The urban and rural Kayah State sample were religiously and ethnically diverse backgrounds (see Methodology Section for full details of KII demographics). The Rakhine urban sample was skewed towards Rakhine Buddhist young people (only two Chin Christians were recruited and no Maramagyi Buddhists). The Rakhine IDP sample were all Rohingya Muslims, with the exception of one Kaman Muslim. All KIIs followed the same general outline, covering the seven areas of interest detailed in the Methodology Section (the full KII guide is available in Appendix C). The area of interest ‘hate speech and harassment’ is separated here into two separate areas due to the high volume of responses and divergent themes that emerged. General usage Facebook was unanimously identified by interviewees as the most popular social media platform among young people, except for a few younger Muslim IDP respondents who suggested that Facebook is not popular among their peers. Reasons given for Facebook’s popularity were consistent with those mentioned in the FGDs and survey, i.e., used by everyone, easy access to news and information. Other platforms mentioned included Messenger, Viber, YouTube, WeChat and TikTok. IMO was mentioned by Rakhine IDP interviewees only. While adults perceived that young people spend more time on their phones (8 hours on average, range 2-18 hours) than young people perceived they do themselves (6 hours on average, range 1-12 hours), a common theme among both was that they tend to use their phones ‘all day’ or at least whenever they are not working or studying, distracting them from other more active tasks. Young people using phones late into the night was another common theme among all demographics, with some adults noting that this negatively impacts on the amount and quality of sleep that many young people are getting. “They use before going to school, lunch time and when back from school. They don’t study anymore and don’t do other activities. When their phone battery is low, they play while charging the battery.” Female, 35 years, Kayaw Christian, Loikaw (Kayah State urban) “Some young people use all night and hardly sleep.” Male, 55 years, Chin Christian, Sittwe (Rakhine State urban) When asked how much of young people’s phone time is spent online, the most common response among all demographics was ‘most’ or ‘nearly all’ of their time. Some respondents differentiated between time spent on social media, browsing the web and playing games (the latter was popular with boys but girls). Some adults considered playing games to be ‘offline’ use, while most young people considered this an ‘online’ activity. Online safety The vast majority of both adults and young people believed that young people are not safe online. However, many noted that whether young people are safe or not depends on their online behaviour and if their activities are risky (e.g., oversharing, connecting with strangers, commenting on political posts). A common theme was that young people generally do not think about their online safety. 58