Pag-search ng salitang 'migrate' sumirit kasabay ng paunang election results

MANILA, Philippines — Tila dismayado raw ang maraming Pilipino sa paunang resulta ng 2019 midterm elections kung pagbabatayan ang bilang ng nagse-search ng mga katang "migrate" at "migration" mula sa Pilipinas, ayon sa obserbasyon ng ilang data scientists.

Kung sisilipin ang mga datos mula sa Google Trends, kapansin-pansin daw ang pagbulusok pataas ng mga numero kaugnay ng paglisan ng bansa.

"What we do know is that 'migrate' was searched 12.5x more in the last 24 hours by people in the Philippines," ani Isaac Reyes, Data Storytelling Instructor ng DataSeer, sa panayam ng PSN nitong Lunes ng gabi.

Bagama't hindi "raw number" ng searches ang ipinakikita rito, isa raw itong search volume metric na ginagamit ng Google para ipagkumpara sa iba pang search terms.

"In general there will be increases and decreases in various search terms as people go to bed and wake up... Increases and decreases within a certain range are expected over time, as well as trends that cause the term to get more or less popular over time."

Sa line chart, makikita raw ang oras-oras na pagpapalit ng numero pagdating sa mga salitang "migrate" at "migration."

"At 4pm today, 'migrating' had a search volume of 1 and 'migrate' had a search volume of 8. At 9pm today, 'migrating' had a search volume of 14 (a 14x increase) and 'migrate' had a search volume of 100 (a 12.5x increase)," dagdag ni Reyes.

Sa Senate race, nagsimulang maglabasan ang mga partial ang unofficial tally bandang 6:15 P.M. ng gabi.

Nagsimula ang botohan alas-sais ng umaga, ika-13 ng Mayo, at nakatakda sanang magtapos ng alas-sais ng gabi.

Sa kabila nito, tinatayang nasa 6.8% lang ng mga presinto sa buong bansa ang nagtapos sa takdang oras.

Maaring 'correlation' lamang

Gayunpaman, ipinaliwanag niya na maaaring "correlation" lang daw ito pa masasabi kung eleksyon nga mismo ang dahilan ng pagtaas ng searches.

"[T]hat correlation does not necessarily imply causation. In simple terms, this means that just because we are seeing PH search terms for 'migrate' and 'migration' spike at the same time the preliminary election results came out, this does not necessarily mean that the preliminary election results caused the search terms to spike," dagdag niya.

"As an example, every summer in Sydney, wearing sunscreen and eating ice cream are highly correlated, but this does not mean that wearing sunscreen causes people to eat ice cream. In reality, there is a third factor, summer, that causes people to both wear sunscreen and eat more ice cream."

Pero hindi naman daw dapat isawalambahala ang mga lumalabas na datos.

Aniya, posible rin talagang resulta ng eleksyon ang nagdulot nito dahil sa napakataas na mga numero.

"Now that said, these results could be indicative of a causal relationship, due to the sheer size of the spikes," sabi ni Reyes.