Abstract
Firearm-related violence is a leading cause of morbidity and mortality and is at the center of a major public health and policy debate in the United States. Despite the critical role of data in informing this debate, accurate and comprehensive data on firearm sales and ownership is not readily available. In this study, we evaluate the potential of using firearm-related internet search queries as a complementary, freely available, and near-real-time data source for tracking firearm sales and ownership that enables analysis at finer geographic and temporal scales. (Here, we examine data by state and by month to compare with other data sources, but search engine volume can be analyzed by city and by the week or by day). We validate search query volume against available data on background checks in all 50 US states, and find that they are highly correlated over time (Pearson’s r = 0.96, Spearman’s ρ = 0.94) and space (Pearson’s r = 0.78, Spearman’s ρ = 0.76). We find that stratifying this analysis by gun type (long-gun vs. handgun) increases this correlation dramatically, across both time and space. We also find a positive association between firearm-related search query volume and firearm-related mortality (Pearson’s r = 0.87, Spearman’s ρ = 0.90), and a negative association with the strength of state-level firearm control policies (Pearson’s r = −0.82, Spearman’s ρ = −0.83). Based on these findings, we propose a framework for prospective surveillance that incorporates firearm-related internet search volume as a useful complementary data source to inform the public health policy debate on this issue.
Highlights
Firearm-related violence is a major source of morbidity and mortality in the United States, with an average of 36,383 deaths and 100,120 injuries per year between 2013 and 20171
National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) data may underestimate firearm sales due to multiple firearm purchases for a single background check, exemptions from background checks based on concealed handgun permits, and lack of information on sales by private sellers, including those conducted at gun shows
The results of this study indicate that firearm-related Internet search query volume is strongly correlated to background checks npj Digital Medicine (2020) 152
Summary
Firearm-related violence is a major source of morbidity and mortality in the United States, with an average of 36,383 deaths and 100,120 injuries per year between 2013 and 20171. High profile mass shootings further fuel the ongoing debate on firearm policy Central to this debate is the challenge of understanding the impact of policy on firearm ownership and firearm-related morbidity and mortality. The most common data source used in firearm policy research is the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS)[2,3]. While this information is a useful surrogate measure, it does not represent actual firearm sales and is greatly impacted by regulations that vary from state to state. Federal provisions that limit certain agencies from engaging in gun control research and tracking have further hindered accurate firearm surveillance[4,5]
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