ANALYSIS OF PUBLIC SEARCH INTEREST IN HOAX AND CONSPIRACY TOWARDS INCREASING OF COVID-19 CONFIRMED CASES IN INDONESIA: STUDY GOOGLE TRENDS

Abstract

The increasing of COVID-19 cases has consistently been followed by the occurrence of an infodemic phenomenon. There is dangerous misinformation and rumors like conspiracy theories, including nonsensical explanations for this pandemic. This study aims to analyze the publics search interest for hoaxes and the conspiracy of COVID-19 towards the increasing of confirmed cases in Indonesia through google trends. The keywords of "covid lie, corona lie, corona hoax, covid hoax, covid lie, corona lie" and "covid conspiracy, corona conspiracy, coronavirus conspiracy" through Google trends, was carried out between 31 December 2019 - 10 September 2020. The data were compared with daily data on Covid-19 cases through time-lag and Pearson correlation (p < 0.005). There is a significant negative correlation (p-value <0.05) between "covid hoax" and "covid conspiracy" with confirmed cases due to COVID-19 in Indonesia. Google trends can be used as an early warning system in identifying patterns of public unrest and can be used as a reference in government policy making as well as the right way of communicating risks to society during the COVID-19 pandemic.