Emotional Appeals in the 2020 #SaveTheChildren Campaign: A Multi-Platform Study of Online Engagement in QAnon Messaging

This study examines how emotional appeals in content related to the #SaveTheChildren campaigns are associated with user engagement across Parler, Gab, Twitter, and Facebook.As emotional appeals are key dimensions in QAnon messaging and #SaveTheChildren in particular, we analyze #SaveTheChildren-related content posted to Parler, Gab, Twitter, and Facebook.Matching content from Parler to posts on other platforms, we first conducted exploratory analyses to understand the emotional landscape and engagement patterns across these platforms.We then tested the consistency in relationships between emotional cues and the engagement these matched #SaveTheChildren posts received across the four platforms.This study found distinct platform-specific patterns: surprise drove engagement on Twitter and Parler, joy was positively associated with engagement only on Facebook, disgust was a mobilizing emotion on Gab, and fear did not mobilize engagement on fringe platforms.Our findings show that the role of emotions in political processes is highly context-dependent, varying significantly across different social media ecosystems, emphasizing the need for cross-platform studies in future research on digital political engagement.