Methodology

Data was gathered through mixed methods content analysis of six Government of Alberta Covid-19 update videos posted on YouTube, and their corresponding social media comments from Facebook Live. Additional supporting data was gathered through the analysis of unique interactions related to the Covid-19 updates and other relevant content. Data collected from Facebook was gathered for qualitative textual analysis and statistical quantitative survey.

Six Government of Alberta Covid-19 update videos were analyzed out of over 240 videos. The six videos were chosen based on key times throughout the pandemic in Alberta, including the first state of emergency declaration, the announcement of strict lockdown restrictions during the second wave, and the “Open for Summer” campaign. Top comments and Facebook reactions were selected to survey the general population through unobtrusive observation and content analysis of social media comments. Specific themes that were flagged are flattening the curve, human rights, and vaccine safety. Corresponding keywords and hashtags include Covid-19, vaccine passport, anti-vax, lockdown, and distrust. Numerical data was collected through Facebook reactions, total number of comments, and total number of views.

Six Government of Alberta Covid-19 update YouTube videos were analyzed for key messages. Data was collected only on the speeches given by government officials. The analysis did not include the question-and-answer portion of the updates. The selected videos range from the start of the pandemic until September 2021: March 17, 2020; December 8, 2020; December 15, 2020; May 26, 2021; September 3, 2021; and September 15, 2021. Due to the unavailability of public response on YouTube, in which comments were turned off by the moderator, the research team used an alternate platform, Facebook Live, to view comments on these Covid-19 update videos. Comments on the Facebook Live videos were reviewed for analysis. Data collection provides quantitative and qualitative data. Quantitative data includes the number of views per video, various health statistics provided by government officials during the videos and a count of the number of times the phrase “as Premier said” or a similar phrase was mentioned by government officials. Qualitative data included key messages and new health measures.

Transcripts for Covid-19 update videos are only available for Chief Medical Officer of Health Dr. Deena Hinshaw’s daily message. Due to the limited time of this project, it was not feasible to transcribe each of the six videos in its entirety and therefore, a count of specific words including “anti-vaccine,” “economy,” and “livelihoods” was not conducted.A list of themes was compiled and quotes from the videos were listed under the appropriate themes.