JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Background:

Different studies have suggested that web search data is useful in forecasting several phenomena from the field of economics to epidemiology or health issues.

Objective:

The objectives of this study are (1) to evaluate the correlation between suicidal rates released by the Spanish National Statistics Institute (INE) and Internet searches trends in Spain reported by Google Trends (GT) for 57 suicide-related terms representing major known risks of suicide that have been already tested in previous scientific studies systematized by Mok et al. [6], that correspond to epigraph 1.1 of Table 1 and are referenced in Table 2. The period of our study was from 2004 to 2013 by the availability of data from both the INE and GT. And (2) to study the differential association between male and female suicide rates published by the INE and Internet searches of these 57 terms.

Methods:

This study collected suicide data from (1) Spain’s INE and (2) local Internet search data from GT, both from January 2004 to December 2013. We investigated and validated fifty seven suicide-related terms already tested in scientific studies previous to 2015 that would be the best predictors of new suicide cases. We then evaluated the nowcasting effects of GT search through cross-correlation analysis and by linear regression of the suicide incidence data with the GT data.

Results:

Suicide rates for that period in Spain were positively associated for general population with the search volume for six terms and negatively for one from the total of fifty seven terms used in previous studies. Suicide rates for men were found significantly different from that of women. The search term “allergy” demonstrated a lead effect for new suicide cases (r=.513, P=.000). The next significant correlating terms for those fifty seven studied were “antidepressant”, “alcohol abstinence”, “relationship breakup” (r=.295, P=.001; r=.295, P=.001; r=.268, P=.002, respectively). Significant differenced results were obtained for men and women.

Conclusions:

A better understanding of Internet search behavior of both men and women in relation to suicide and related topics may help design effective suicide prevention programs based on information provided by search robots and other big-data sources.