Emotional appeals and social support in organizational YouTube videos during COVID-19

Through a content analysis of 106 organizational YouTube videos during COVID-19 from March to September 2020 and sentiment analysis of the 9398 audiences’ comments, this study aims to analyze the emotional appeals, social support, and preventive behaviors reflected in the organizational YouTube videos and how such message features influenced audience engagement and audience comments sentiment. We found that hope and happiness are the two emotions used most frequently. Emotional appeals changed over time. Though videos in March and April mainly adopted fear and anxiety appeals, humor became more dominant after May, 2020. Emotional appeals also increased views and positive comments. Videos providing informational and emotional support received more likes. Videos produced at different stages of the pandemic also promoted preventive behaviors differently, with more videos promoting wearing masks after May. Sports/entertainment industries produced videos that received more positive comments than other industries.