ABSTRACT
Researching African media audiences and users is urgent more than ever because of the rapidly changing media landscape on the continent in the last few decades. In recent years, media content on the continent has become more diversified as a result of the liberalization of broadcasting, the emergence of private radio and television stations and the growing availability of foreign channels via satellite television. Most African countries have also experienced a rather spectacular growth in access and availability of both mass media devices and digital technologies. In the late 1990s, access to television sets and radio receivers was limited, with 22 percent of Africans having access to a radio in 1997, and only 6 percent reporting to own a television set.1 Although no recent comprehensive statistics are available for the continent, country surveys suggest sharp increases in access to mass media devices in recent years. For example, in 2013, 76 percent of Ghanaians reported to have access to a television while 84 percent had access to a radio.2 Access is likely to be significantly lower in rural as compared to urban areas, and newspapers continue to have fairly modest circulation rates and are often only affordable to a minority of urban readers.
