SpaceX raw data.xlsx

This study investigated how SpaceX shapes public perception through its online presence by analyzing audience comments on YouTube videos using both reflexive thematic analysis (RTA) and critical discourse analysis (CDA). The RTA identified five dominant audience themes: admiration for Musk and SpaceX’s leadership, expectations about technical quality, hopes for a multiplanetary future, skepticism toward ambitious claims, and expressions of global belonging through space exploration. Building on this, CDA uncovered how these themes are embedded within broader ideological discourses—such as techno-determinism, corporate hero-worship, and colonial imaginaries—that position SpaceX not only as a company but as a symbol of capitalist progress, human destiny, and planetary transformation. The study demonstrates how audiences actively co-construct SpaceX’s public narrative through support, inquiry, skepticism, and ideological framing, with practical recommendations for SpaceX’s communication strategy, including the need to improve technical quality, manage public expectations, thoughtfully leverage leadership narratives, and engage transparently with ethical, global, and ideological concerns in space exploration.