This study explores how apology videos differ across platforms and speaker statuses, and how these factors shape their perception by an audience. Linguistic coding on a dataset of publicly available apologies from the past five years is used to identify several linguistic markers that influence the perception of apology videos. In addition to these linguistic markers, videos are analyzed based on speaker type (celebrities, online influencers, private individuals, and brands) and format (long-form pre-recorded videos, short social media clips, and traditional live media statements). A survey measures audience reactions, including emotions elicited, perceived sincerity, and perceived effectiveness. A qualitative analysis then compares apology strategies to these audience perceptions in order to identify patterns.
