Information-seeking in the Wake of Tragedy: An Examination of Public Response to Mass Shootings Using Google Search Data

2020 ◽  
pp. 073112142096478
Author(s):  
Daniel Charles Semenza ◽  
John A. Bernau
Keyword(s):  
Information Seeking ◽  
Social Science Research ◽  
News Coverage ◽  
Public Information ◽  
The United States ◽  
Gun Control ◽  
Mass Shootings ◽  
Public Response ◽  
Search Data ◽  
Google Search

Mass shootings are a highly visible form of violence in the United States, although public response to these events varies considerably. Drawing on social problems and collective threat perception literature, we use search data for all Google-using Americans following mass shootings since 2004 to examine how event attributes such as the number of victims, venue, and type of weapon(s) predict public information-seeking related to gun control and gun rights. The results demonstrate that the number of victims, news coverage, school venue, and the use of certain weapons all significantly increase public interest in gun control and gun rights. These key predictors interact with one another to further influence information-seeking behaviors related to both gun control and gun rights. We conclude with a discussion of our findings and the potential for Google Search data in social science research.

scholarly journals Evidence from internet search data shows information-seeking responses to news of local COVID-19 cases

2020 ◽  
Vol 117 (21) ◽  
pp. 11220-11222 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ana I. Bento ◽  
Thuy Nguyen ◽  
Coady Wing ◽  
Felipe Lozano-Rojas ◽  
Yong-Yeol Ahn ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Information Seeking ◽  
Public Discourse ◽  
Public Information ◽  
The United States ◽  
School Closures ◽  
The Public ◽  
Global Pandemic ◽  
First Case ◽  
Search Data ◽  
Collective Attention

The COVID-19 outbreak is a global pandemic with community circulation in many countries, including the United States, with confirmed cases in all states. The course of this pandemic will be shaped by how governments enact timely policies and disseminate information and by how the public reacts to policies and information. Here, we examine information-seeking responses to the first COVID-19 case public announcement in a state. Using an event study framework for all US states, we show that such news increases collective attention to the crisis right away. However, the elevated level of attention is short-lived, even though the initial announcements are followed by increasingly strong policy measures. Specifically, searches for “coronavirus” increased by about 36% (95% CI: 27 to 44%) on the day immediately after the first case announcement but decreased back to the baseline level in less than a week or two. We find that people respond to the first report of COVID-19 in their state by immediately seeking information about COVID-19, as measured by searches for coronavirus, coronavirus symptoms, and hand sanitizer. On the other hand, searches for information regarding community-level policies (e.g., quarantine, school closures, testing) or personal health strategies (e.g., masks, grocery delivery, over-the-counter medications) do not appear to be immediately triggered by first reports. These results are representative of the study period being relatively early in the epidemic, and more-elaborate policy responses were not yet part of the public discourse. Further analysis should track evolving patterns of responses to subsequent flows of public information.

Abstract T P273: Internet-Based Information Seeking Behavior for Transient Ischemic Attack

Stroke ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 46 (suppl_1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Vida Abedi ◽  
Marieme Mbaye ◽  
Georgios Tsivgoulis ◽  
Shailesh Male ◽  
Nitin Goyal ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Transient Ischemic Attack ◽  
Information Seeking ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
Information Seeking Behavior ◽  
Online Search ◽  
Seeking Behavior ◽  
Search Data ◽  
Ischemic Attack ◽  
Google Search

Background &Purpose: In recent years, Internet became an increasingly important tool for accessing health information and is being used more frequently to promote public health. In this study, we used Google search data to explore information seeking behavior for transient ischemic attack (TIA). Methods: We selected two groups of keywords related to TIA -“Transient Ischemic Attack” and “Mini Stroke” - after examining several related search keywords. We obtained all available online search data performed in the United States from the Google search engine for a ten year span - January 2004 to December 2013. The monthly and daily search data for the selected keywords were analyzed - using a moving window strategy - to explore the trends, peaks and declining effects. Results: There were three significant concurrent peaks in the Google search data for the selected keywords. Each peak was directly associated with media coverage and news headlines related to the incident of TIA in a public figure. (Figure 1) Following each event, it took an average of two weeks for the search trend to return to its respective average value. The trend was steady for “Transient Ischemic Attack”; however, the search interest for the keyword “mini stroke” shows a steady increase. The overall search interest for the selected keywords was significantly higher in the southeastern United States. Conclusions: Our study shows that changes in online search behavior can be associated with media coverage of key events (in our case TIA) in public figures. These findings suggest that online health promotion campaigns might be more effective if increased promptly after similar media coverage.

scholarly journals Fighting National Amnesia: Profiling Public Attention to Mass Shootings in The United States

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Miles Chandler
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
Public Perception ◽  
The United States ◽  
Gun Control ◽  
Decay Length ◽  
Public Attention ◽  
Mass Shootings ◽  
Search Volume ◽  
Mass Shooting

This study aims to identify factors that shape public perception and emotional response to mass shootings in the United States. I suggest that patterns of media coverage inform public consciousness and collective emotion. Newsworthiness and gatekeeping theories assert that school or prejudicial shootings and those with more victims are reported on at higher rates. Literature on racial and immigrant bias in media demonstrates that non-white shooters also generate more discourse. The directed construction of shootings and the affective public responses they generate align well with the concept of a “moral panic.” Using all valid cases from the Mother Jones Mass Shootings:1982-2019 dataset which align temporally with Google Trends data, I analyze the volume and decay rate of search topics “mass shooting,” “gun control,” and “open carry,” following US mass shootings from 2004-2019. Shootings with more victims predict a higher volume of searches for “mass shooting,” and shorter search periods for “gun control” and “open carry.” Shootings with educational and religious targets had no significant effects on search patterns. Workplace shootings result in longer search periods for “mass shooting,” and shorter periods for “gun control.” Non-white shooters generate shorter search decay for “open carry.” The results support theories of media gatekeeping, suggesting events with more casualties generate more intense public attention. The consistent negative correlation between search volume and decay length suggests that sensational responses to shootings are not sustainable over long periods of time and prohibit pragmatically addressing mass shootings.

scholarly journals The impact of news exposure on collective attention in the United States during the 2016 Zika epidemic

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michele Tizzoni ◽  
André Panisson ◽  
Daniela Paolotti ◽  
Ciro Cattuto
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Disease Transmission ◽  
Information Seeking ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
Public Awareness ◽  
News Coverage ◽  
The United States ◽  
Human Behaviour ◽  
Disease Dynamics ◽  
The Impact

AbstractIn recent years, many studies have drawn attention to the important role of collective awareness and human behaviour during epidemic outbreaks. A number of modelling efforts have investigated the interaction between the disease transmission dynamics and human behaviour change mediated by news coverage and by information spreading in the population. Yet, given the scarcity of data on public awareness during an epidemic, few studies have relied on empirical data. Here, we use fine-grained, geo-referenced data from three online sources – Wikipedia, the GDELT Project and the Internet Archive – to quantify population-scale information seeking about the 2016 Zika virus epidemic in the U.S., explicitly linking such behavioural signal to epidemiological data. Geolocalized Wikipedia pageview data reveal that visiting patterns of Zika-related pages in Wikipedia were highly synchronized across the United States and largely explained by exposure to national television broadcast. Contrary to the assumption of some theoretical models, news volume and Wikipedia visiting patterns were not significantly correlated with the magnitude or the extent of the epidemic. Attention to Zika, in terms of Zika-related Wikipedia pageviews, was high at the beginning of the outbreak, when public health agencies raised an international alert and triggered media coverage, but subsequently exhibited an activity profile that suggests nonlinear dependencies and memory effects in the relation between information seeking, media pressure, and disease dynamics. This calls for a new and more general modelling framework to describe the interaction between media exposure, public awareness and disease dynamics during epidemic outbreaks.

scholarly journals Nowcasting and forecasting provincial-level SARS-CoV-2 case positivity using google search data in South Africa

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elaine O. Nsoesie ◽  
Karla Therese L. Sy ◽  
Olubusola Oladeji ◽  
Raesetje Sefala ◽  
Brooke E. Nichols
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Remote Sensing ◽  
Social Media ◽  
Information Seeking ◽  
Disease Surveillance ◽  
Data Sources ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Search Data ◽  
Response Measures ◽  
Google Search

ABSTRACTData from non-traditional data sources, such as social media, search engines, and remote sensing, have previously demonstrated utility for disease surveillance. Few studies, however, have focused on countries in Africa, particularly during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. In this study, we use searches of COVID-19 symptoms, questions, and at-home remedies submitted to Google to model COVID-19 in South Africa, and assess how well the Google search data forecast short-term COVID-19 trends. Our findings suggest that information seeking trends on COVID-19 could guide models for anticipating COVID-19 trends and coordinating appropriate response measures.

scholarly journals #MeToo and Google Inquiries Into Sexual Violence: A Hashtag Campaign Can Sustain Information Seeking

2019 ◽  
pp. 088626051986819 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michelle R. Kaufman ◽  
Debangan Dey ◽  
Ciprian Crainiceanu ◽  
Mark Dredze
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Abuse ◽  
Sexual Assault ◽  
Sexual Harassment ◽  
Sexual Violence ◽  
Information Seeking ◽  
The United States ◽  
Study Objective ◽  
The Media ◽  
Talk Show Host ◽  
Google Search

The #MeToo Movement has brought new attention to sexual harassment and assault. While the movement originates with activist Tarana Burke, actor Alyssa Milano used the phrase on Twitter in October 2017 in response to multiple sexual harassment allegations against Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein. Within 24 hours, 53,000 people tweeted comments and/or shared personal experiences of sexual violence. The study objective was to measure how information seeking via Google searches for sexual harassment and assault changed following Milano’s tweet and whether this change was sustained in spite of celebrity scandals. Weekly Google search inquiries in the United States were downloaded for the terms metoo, sexual assault, sexual harassment, sexual abuse, and rape for January 1, 2017 to July 15, 2018. Seven related news events about perpetrator accusations were considered. Results showed that searches for metoo increased dramatically after the Weinstein accusation and stayed high during subsequent accusations. A small decrease in searches followed, but the number remained very high relative to baseline (the period before the Weinstein accusation). Searches for sexual assault and sexual harassment increased substantially immediately following the Weinstein accusation, stayed high during subsequent accusations, and saw a decline after the accusation of Matt Lauer (talk show host; last event considered). We estimated a 40% to 70% reduction in searches 6 months after the Lauer accusation, though the increase in searches relative to baseline remained statistically significant. For sexual abuse and rape, the number of searches returned close to baseline by 6 months. It appears that the #MeToo movement sparked greater information seeking that was sustained beyond the associated events. Given its recent ubiquitous use in the media and public life, hashtag activism such as #MeToo can be used to draw further attention to the next steps in addressing sexual assault and harassment, moving public web inquiries from information seeking to action.

Anxious? Just Google It: Social Ecological Factors of Internet Search Records on Anxiety

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Takeshi Hamamura ◽  
Christian Shaunlyn Chan
Keyword(s):  
Social Science Research ◽  
Ecological Factors ◽  
Population Level ◽  
Science Research ◽  
Psychological Research ◽  
Self Report ◽  
Internet Search ◽  
Major Disaster ◽  
Search Data ◽  
Google Search

Records of Internet search are increasingly used in social science research. Three studies reported here tested (a) whether population-level anxiety is reflected in Internet search data and (b) the socio-ecological and cultural factors of anxiety. Using data from Japan, we found that the Google search rates of anxiety are associated with self-report anxiety (Study 1), and that the search rates increased following a major disaster (Study 2). These findings suggest that anxiety is searched more often on the Internet when and where people are feeling anxious. However, while search rates of anxiety increased since 2010, there was no sign of worsening anxiety among Japanese in two large national data on self-report anxiety (Study 1). Study 3 used search data to examine an anxiety-related cultural phenomenon. Consistent with a lay belief that is rarely empirically examined, we found that anxiety among Japanese increases in spring when millions in the country make school and career transitions. This pattern was somewhat more pronounced in large cities and was not evident in other negative emotions examined. Together, these findings add to psychologists’ understanding of anxiety particularly its vulnerability to environmental threat and social disconnection. These findings also demonstrate the potential of Internet search data in advancing psychological research, particularly in examining mental processes’ socio-ecological, cultural, and temporal factors.

A methodological pilot for gathering data through text-messaging to study question-asking in everyday life

2018 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 197-214 ◽  
Author(s):  
Darren Gergle ◽  
Eszter Hargittai
Keyword(s):  
Everyday Life ◽  
Information Seeking ◽  
Text Messaging ◽  
Social Science Research ◽  
Science Research ◽  
The United States ◽  
Diverse Group ◽  
Question Asking ◽  
Gathering Data

How do people find answers to questions they encounter in everyday life? While extensive research has examined how people go about finding answers to questions online, there has been little work investigating the issue from a more holistic, in situ perspective that covers the various devices, resources, and contextual factors that influence everyday question-asking experiences. To address this, we developed a text-messaging-based data-collection framework. This paper details our approach including reflections on both the benefits and challenges of the methodology for researchers seeking to apply similar approaches to social science research. In doing so, we demonstrate how our methodology helps establish a contextually rich understanding of information-seeking processes. We also demonstrate our approach to analyzing data from a small but diverse group of adults across the United States about their everyday question-asking experiences.

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