The impact of stay-at-home orders on mental health: Evidence from search-based symptoms

Abstract

I investigate the impact of the implementation of stay-at-home orders on the incidence of mental health conditions in the US during the first year of the coronavirus pandemic. I use a novel dataset that maps search queries to thirty mental health symptoms. Exploiting the staggered implementation of lockdowns, I document that the enaction of the stay-at-home orders increased mental health searches related to various anxiety disorders, severe forms of depression, sleep disorders, attention de cit, and epilepsy. Treated states are estimated to have experienced two mental distress waves in April-May and November-December