000166113 001__ 166113 000166113 005__ 20210819131359.0 000166113 0247_ $$2doi$$a10.22004/ag.econ.166113 000166113 037__ $$a327-2016-12719 000166113 041__ $$aeng 000166113 245__ $$aNowcasting Obesity in the U.S. Using Google Search Volume Data 000166113 260__ $$c2014-06 000166113 269__ $$a2014-06 000166113 300__ $$a33 000166113 336__ $$aConference Paper/ Presentation 000166113 520__ $$a“Googling” is now ubiquitous in our society. We typically start searching on Google before we make purchase decisions or when we have interest in certain topics. Aggregating these search data can provide us with real-time and possibly accurate information on people's behavior. In fact, Google keeps tracks of all the search queries and has accumulated a tremendous amount of information about people's interest at the society level. It currently provides search volume data of keywords for different regions and time intervals on its free and public service of Google Trends. An interesting and hot research area is how to exploit the Google Search volume data in innovative ways to benefit our society. This paper aims to reveal the connection between obesity prevalence and people’s online search behavior in the United States by combining data from Google Trends and data from Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) which is updated by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) annually. We first handselected keywords that are associated to people's life style and used panel data model to study association between search pattern and obesity level. We found significant correlation power of those keywords with Body Mass Index (BMI) level and results suggest great promise of the idea of obesity monitoring through real-time Google Trends data. We believe this is an important finding and is particularly attractive for government health institutions and private businesses such as insurance companies etc. 000166113 546__ $$aEnglish 000166113 650__ $$aFood Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety 000166113 650__ $$aHealth Economics and Policy 000166113 700__ $$aSarigul, Sercan 000166113 700__ $$aRui, Huaxia 000166113 8564_ $$955a3469e-0a65-47db-8571-47eddc11450a$$s1089926$$uhttps://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/166113/files/AAEA_Sercan_Sarigul.pdf 000166113 887__ $$ahttp://purl.umn.edu/166113 000166113 909CO $$ooai:ageconsearch.umn.edu:166113$$pGLOBAL_SET 000166113 912__ $$nSubmitted by Mallory Pagel (pagel107@umn.edu) on 2014-04-17T17:22:48Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Sercan_Sarigul_AAEA.pdf: 1569119 bytes, checksum: 96db6dbbd224cd6ef021a4b44929accd (MD5) 000166113 912__ $$nMade available in DSpace on 2014-04-17T17:22:48Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Sercan_Sarigul_AAEA.pdf: 1569119 bytes, checksum: 96db6dbbd224cd6ef021a4b44929accd (MD5) Previous issue date: 2014-04-03 000166113 913__ $$aLicense granted by Mallory Pagel (pagel107@umn.edu) on 2014-04-17T17:14:13Z (GMT): <center> <h2> Deposit Agreement </h2> </center> I represent that I am the creator of the digital material identified herein (&ldquo;Work&rdquo;). I represent that the work is original and that I either own all rights of copyright or have the right to deposit the copy in a digital archive such as AgEcon Search. I represent that in regard to any non-original material included in the Work I have secured written permission of the copyright owner (s) for this use or believe this use is allowed by law. I further represent that I have included all appropriate credits and attributions. I hereby grant the Regents of the University of Minnesota (&ldquo;University&rdquo;), through AgEcon Search, a non-exclusive right to access, reproduce, and distribute the Work, in whole or in part, for the purposes of security, preservation, and perpetual access. I grant the University a limited, non-exclusive right to make derivative works for the purpose of migrating the Work to other media or formats in order to preserve access to the Work. I do not transfer or intend to transfer any right of copyright or other intellectual property to the University. If the Deposit Agreement is executed by the Author�s Representative, the Representative shall separately execute the following representation: I represent that I am authorized by the Author to execute this Deposit Agreement on behalf of the Author. 000166113 980__ $$a327 000166113 982__ $$gAgricultural and Applied Economics Association>2014 AAEA/EAAE/CAES Joint Symposium: Social Networks, Social Media and the Economics of Food, May 29-30, 2014, Montreal, Canada