Beginning of the Week is Time for Healthy Thoughts

For those worried about what's going on with their health, a recent study shows that Monday and Tuesday are the most common days in which people search for related issues online.

According to researchers from San Diego State University, they found that the beginning of the week was the most likely time for health-related Google searchers, including terms like "healthy," etc. In fact, findings revealed that searchers for health topics were 30 percent more frequent earlier in the week than at later times.

For the study, researchers used a daily measure to determine the proportion of healthy searchers to the total number of searchers completed each day. They also discovered that this pattern was continuously consistent with time.

"Many illnesses have a weekly clock with spikes early in the week," said lead researcher John W. Ayers of San Diego State University, via a press release. "This research indicates that a similar rhythm exists for positive health behaviors, motivating a new research agenda to understand why this pattern exists and how such a pattern can be utilized to improve the public's health."

"We could be seeing this effect because of the perception that Monday is a fresh start, akin to a mini New Year's Day. People tend to indulge in less healthy behaviors on the weekend, so Monday can serve as a 'health reset' to get back on track with their health regimens," said co-author Joanna Cohen, professor at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, said the release.

"It's interesting to see such a consistent and similar rhythm emerging from search data," added Benjamin Althouse, study co-author and Omidyar Fellow at the Santa Fe Institute. "These consistent rhythms in healthy searches likely reflect something about our collective mindset, and understanding these rhythms could lead to insights about the nature of health behavior change."

"The challenge we face in public health is to help people sustain healthy behaviors over time. Since Monday comes around every seven days when people are 'open to buy' health, it can be used as a cue to help create healthy habits for life," study co-author Morgan Johnson from The Monday Campaigns concluded.

More information regarding the findings can be seen via the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.