Analysis of Popular Science Content on YouTube Available in Sign Language

This article analyses the impact of outreach channels on the YouTube platform that use sign language to communicate scientific information to Spanish-speaking individuals with hearing disabilities. To conduct this analysis, we apply a quantitative exploratory approach to examine the content produced by the channels in 2022 and 2023, and focus on their level of engagement. Our findings reveal that channels of state organizations show a high number of views but exhibit very poor engagement. None of these institutional accounts feature videos communicating scientific advances; instead, they primarily focus on providing general information for the deaf community. On the other hand, channels run by scientific youtubers using sign language show much fewer views, but their engagement rates are much higher than those of institutional channels. This indicates that, although there is interest in scientific topics among sign language users, there is very little scientific dissemination content in this language, which makes it difficult for people with hearing disabilities to access information in an inclusive and equitable manner.