Assessment Public Interest towards COVID-19 during Movement Control Order in Malaysia
Abstract
In Malaysia, research on the public interest in COVID-19 are lacking. Using Google TrendsTM (GT) data, this study aimed to explore public interest toward covid-19 during the early time of Movement Control Order (MCO) and the practice of social distancing among Malaysian in combating COVID-19. A GT search for “COVID-19’ was performed and the Relative Search Volume (RSV) were compared to the number of reported COVID-19 cases, deaths and social distancing data. Malaysia reach its full public interest when the first deaths of COVID-19 were reported, approximately one day before the MCO. The trend was fluctuating until it started to drop drastically at the end of MCO Phase 1 and continued to decline until the end of Conditional MCO (CMCO). During the Pre-MCO, significant correlations exist between daily cases, daily deaths and GT. Social distancing data were significantly correlated with GT during the Pre-MCO indicating increased public awareness on the preventive measure before the start of MCO. Public interest measurement using GT can help to monitor the progression of COVID-19 in Malaysia. Continuous effort to create awareness and sustaining the public interest is a necessity to control the COVID-19 transmission.
References
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BBC News. (2020). Coronavirus: Cases jump in Iran and Italy. from https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-51783242
Chowell, G., Bertozzi, S. M., Colchero, M. A., Lopez-Gatell, H., Alpuche-Aranda, C., Hernandez, M., & Miller, M. A. (2009). Severe respiratory disease concurrent with the circulation of H1N1 Influenza. New England Journal of Medicine, 361(7), 674-679. doi: https://doi.org/10.1056/NEJMoa0904023
Cleaton, J. M., Viboud, C., Simonsen, L., Hurtado, A. M., & Chowell, G. (2015). Characterizing Ebola transmission patterns based on internet news reports. Clinical Infectious Diseases, 62(1), 24-31. doi: https://doi.org/10.1093/cid/civ748
Daim, N. (2020). Over 20,000 arrested for violating MCO since March 18. https://www.nst.com.my/news/nation/2020/04/587646/over-20000-arrested-violating-mco-march-18
Delacre, M., Leys, C., Mora, Y. L., & Lakens, D. (2019). Taking parametric assumptions seriously: Arguments for the use of Welch’s F-test instead of the classical F-test in one-way ANOVA. International Review of Social Psychology, 32(1), 13. doi: http://doi.org/10.5334/irsp.198
DOSM. (2020). COVID-19 current situation in Malaysia. Department of Statistics Malaysia. https://ukkdosm.github.io/covid-19
Effenberger, M., Kronbichler, A., Shin, J. I., Mayer, G., Tilg, H., & Perco, P. (2020). Association of the COVID-19 pandemic with Internet Search Volumes: A Google TrendsTM Analysis. International Journal of Infectious Diseases, 95, 192-197. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijid.2020.04.033
Elengoe, A. (2020). COVID-19 Outbreak in Malaysia. Osong Public Health and Research Perspect, 11(3), 93-100. doi: https://doi.org/10.24171/j.phrp.2020.11.3.08
Fox, S. (2005). Health information online. Pew Internet & American Life Project. https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2005/05/17/health-information-online/
Gautheir, T. D. (2001). Detecting trends using Spearman's rank correlation coefficient. Environmental Forensics, 2(4), 359-362. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/713848278
He, F., Deng, Y., & Li, W. (2020). Coronavirus disease 2019: What we know? Journal of Medical Virology, 92(7), 719-725. doi: https://doi.org/10.1002/jmv.25766
Hilbert, M., & López, P. (2011). The world’s technological capacity to store, communicate, and compute information. Science, 332(6025), 60-65. doi: https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1200970
Hou, Z., Du, F., Zhou, X., Jiang, H., Martin, S., Larson, H., & Lin, L. (2020). Cross-country comparison of public awareness, rumors, and behavioral responses to the COVID-19 Epidemic: Infodemiology study. Journal of Medical Internet Research, 22(8), e21143. doi: https://doi.org/10.2196/21143
Husain, I., Briggs, B., Lefebvre, C., Cline, D. M., Stopyra, J. P., O'Brien, M. C., . . . Countryman, C. (2020). Fluctuation of public interest in COVID-19 in the United States: Retrospective analysis of Google Trends search data. JMIR Public Health Surveillance, 6(3), e19969. doi: https://doi.org/10.2196/19969
Husnayain, A., Fuad, A., & Su, E. C.-Y. (2020). Applications of Google Search Trends for risk communication in infectious disease management: A case study of the COVID-19 outbreak in Taiwan. International Journal of Infectious Diseases, 95, 221-223. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijid.2020.03.021
IHME. (2020). COVID-19 mortality, infection, testing, hospital resource use, and social distancing projections. Seattle, United States of America: Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME), Universiti of Washington.
Ison, D. (2020). Statistical procedures for evaluating trends in coronavirus disease-19 cases in the United States. International Journal of Health Sciences, 14(5), 23-31.
Kaos, J., & Rahimy, R. (2020). Stricter rules to be enforced during second phase of MCO. https://www.thestar.com.my/news/nation/2020/03/31/stricter-rules-to-be-enforced-during-second-phase-of-mco
Kutlu, Ö. (2020). Analysis of dermatologic conditions in Turkey and Italy by using Google Trends analysis in the era of the COVID-19 pandemic. Dermatologic Therapy, 33(6), e13949. doi: https://doi.org/10.1111/dth.13949
Lee, S., & Lee, D. K. (2018). What is the proper way to apply the multiple comparison test? Korean Journal of Anesthesiology, 71(5), 353-360. doi: https://doi.org/10.4097/kja.d.18.00242
Lim, J. L., Ong, C. Y., Xie, B., & Low, L. L. (2020). Estimating information seeking-behaviour of public in Malaysia during COVID-19 by using Google Trends. The Malaysian Journal of Medical Sciences : MJMS, 27(5), 202-204. doi: https://doi.org/10.21315/mjms2020.27.5.16
Ling, R., & Lee, J. (2016). Disease monitoring and health campaign evaluation using Google search activities for HIV and AIDS, stroke, colorectal Cancer, and marijuana use in Canada: A retrospective Observational Study. JMIR Public Health Surveillance, 2(2), e156. doi: https://doi.org/10.2196/publichealth.6504
Mavragani, A. (2020). Tracking COVID-19 in Europe: Infodemiology approach. JMIR Public Health Surveillance, 6(2), e18941. doi: https://doi.org/10.2196/18941
Myers, L., & Sirois, M. J. (2006). Spearman Correlation Coefficients, Differences between. In S. Kotz, C. B. Read, n. Balakrishnan, B. Vidakovic & N. L. Johnson (Eds.), Encyclopedia of Statistical Sciences.
Rivers, C., Chretien, J.-P., Riley, S., Pavlin, J. A., Woodward, A., Brett-Major, D., . . . Pollett, S. (2019). Using “outbreak science” to strengthen the use of models during epidemics. Nature Communications, 10(1), 3102. doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-019-11067-2
Shariatpanahi, S. P., Jafari, A., Sadeghipour, M., Azadeh-Fard, N., Majidzadeh-A, K., Farahmand, L., & Madjid Ansari, A. (2017). Assessing the effectiveness of disease awareness programs: Evidence from Google Trends data for the world awareness dates. Telematics and Informatics, 34(7), 904-913. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tele.2017.03.007
WHO. (2020a). COVID-19 situation overview in Malaysia. https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/wpro---documents/countries/malaysia/coronavirus-disease-(covid-19)-situation-reports-in-malaysia/situation-report-malaysia-8-may-2020-final.pdf?sfvrsn=ba5876cb_12
WHO. (2020b). WHO Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) dashboard. https://covid19.who.int/
Ye, J., Xiao, C., Esteves, R. M., & Rong, C. (2015, 2015//). Time Series Similarity Evaluation Based on Spearman’s Correlation Coefficients and Distance Measures. Paper presented at the Cloud Computing and Big Data, Cham.
Yusof, A. N. M., Muuti, M. Z., Ariffin, L. A., & Tan, M. K. M. (2020). Sharing Information on COVID-19: the ethical challenges in the Malaysian setting. Asian Bioethics Review, 12(3), 349-361. doi: 10.1007/s41649-020-00132-4
Published
2021-07-01
How to Cite
MAT DIN, Hazwan et al.
Assessment Public Interest towards COVID-19 during Movement Control Order in Malaysia.
Asian Journal of Research in Education and Social Sciences, [S.l.], v. 3, n. 2, p. 80-90, july 2021.
Available at: <https://myjms.mohe.gov.my/index.php/ajress/article/view/13655>. Date accessed: 13 oct. 2024.
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