COVID-19, Lockdowns and Well-Being: Evidence from Google Trends

Abel Brodeur, Andrew Clark, Sarah Flèche and Nattavudh Powdthavee

No 13204, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: The COVID-19 pandemic has led many governments to implement lockdowns. While lockdowns may help to contain the spread of the virus, they may result in substantial damage to population well-being. We use Google Trends data to test whether the lockdowns implemented in Europe and America led to changes in well-being related topic search terms. Using differences-in-differences and a regression discontinuity design to evaluate the causal effects of lockdown, we find a substantial increase in the search intensity for boredom in Europe and the US. We also found a significant increase in searches for loneliness, worry and sadness, while searches for stress, suicide and divorce on the contrary fell. Our results suggest that people's mental health may have been severely affected by the lockdown.

Keywords: boredom; COVID-19; loneliness; well-being (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I12 I31 J22 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 55 pages
Date: 2020-05
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-big, nep-hap, nep-hea, nep-ltv and nep-soc
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (49)

Published - published in: Journal of Public Economics, 2021, 193, 104346

Downloads: (external link)
https://docs.iza.org/dp13204.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: COVID-19, lockdowns and well-being: Evidence from Google Trends (2021)
Working Paper: COVID-19, Lockdowns and Well-Being: Evidence from Google Trends (2021)
Working Paper: COVID-19, Lockdowns and Well-Being: Evidence from Google Trends (2021)
Working Paper: Covid-19, lockdowns and well-being: evidence from Google trends (2020)
Working Paper: COVID-19, lockdowns and well-being: evidence from Google Trends (2020)
Working Paper: COVID-19, Lockdowns and Well-Being: Evidence from Google Trends (2020)
Working Paper: COVID-19, Lockdowns and Well-Being: Evidence from Google Trends (2020)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:iza:izadps:dp13204

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
IZA, Margard Ody, P.O. Box 7240, D-53072 Bonn, Germany

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA) IZA, P.O. Box 7240, D-53072 Bonn, Germany. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Holger Hinte ().