World map showing countries by nominal GDP per capita in 2008, IMF estimates as of April 2009. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Last week, a study (Future Orientation Index) ranking the most forward thinking nations came out. Switzerland ranked #2, up from #7 the previous year. Scientists correlated data from Google searches, the CIA World Factbook and national economic performance. In other words, researchers looked at how many times people in 2012 used Google to search for “2013” than for “2011.” They discovered strong links between changes in the information users seek online and events in the real world.
Why is this important? Aside from the obvious reasons, there’s a big one, GDP (Gross Domestic Product). Professor Tobias Preis of Warwick Business School said: “In general, we find a strong tendency for countries in which Google users enquire more about the future to exhibit a larger per capita GDP… There seems to be a relationship with the economic success of a country and the information seeking behavior of its citizens online.”
Okay, so there’s a relationship between looking for information about the future and wealth. Why is there one? What can people say about this relationship? Co-author Dr Suzy Moat stated “[w]e see two leading explanations for this relationship between search activity and GDP… [T]hese findings may reflect international differences in attention to the future and the past, where a focus on the future supports economic success.” She continued “these findings may reflect international differences in the type of information sought online, perhaps due to economic influences on available Internet infrastructure.”
By the way. Germany took the top spot, while Pakistan ranked at the bottom of their list as #45. The US came in at #11.
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