Shifting Climates: Climate Change Communication from YouTube to TikTok

Public discourse on critical issues such as climate change is progressively shifting to social media platforms that prioritize short-form video content. Content creators acting on those platforms play a pivotal role in shaping the discourse, yet the dynamics of communication and audience reactions across platforms remain underexplored. To improve our understanding of this transition, we studied the video content produced by 21 prominent YouTube creators who have expanded their influence to TikTok as information disseminators. Using dictionary-based tools and BERT-based embeddings, we analyzed the transcripts of nearly 7k climate-related videos across both platforms and the 574k comments they received. We found that, when publishing on TikTok, creators use a more emotionally resonant, self-referential, and action-oriented language compared to YouTube. We also observed a strong semantic alignment between videos and comments, with creators who excel at diversifying their TikTok content from YouTube typically receiving responses that more closely align with their produced content. This suggests that tailored communication strategies hold greater promise in directing public discussion towards desired topics, which bears implications for the design of effective climate communication campaigns.