Changes in Reproductive Health Information-Seeking Behaviors After the Dobbs Decision: Systematic Search of the Wikimedia Database
Bibliographic record
Abstract
BACKGROUND: After the US Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, confusion followed regarding the legality of abortion in different states across the country. Recent studies found increased Google searches for abortion-related terms in restricted states after the Dobbsv. Jackson Women's Health Organization decision was leaked. As patients and providers use Wikipedia (Wikimedia Foundation) as a predominant medical information source, we hypothesized that changes in reproductive health information-seeking behavior could be better understood by examining Wikipedia article traffic. OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to examine trends in Wikipedia usage for abortion and contraception information before and after the Dobbs decision. METHODS: Page views of abortion- and contraception-related Wikipedia pages were scraped. Temporal changes in page views before and after the Dobbs decision were then analyzed to explore changes in baseline views, differences in views for abortion-related information in states with restrictive abortion laws versus nonrestrictive states, and viewer trends on contraception-related pages. RESULTS: Wikipedia articles related to abortion topics had significantly increased page views following the leaked and final Dobbs decision. There was a 103-fold increase in the page views for the Wikipedia article Roe v. Wade following the Dobbs decision leak (mean 372,654, SD 135,478 vs mean 3614, SD 248; P<.001) and a 67-fold increase in page views following the release of the final Dobbs decision (mean 8942, SD 402 vs mean 595,871, SD 178,649; P<.001). Articles about abortion in the most restrictive states had a greater increase in page views (mean 40.6, SD 12.7; 18/51, 35% states) than articles about abortion in states with some restrictions or protections (mean 26.8, SD 7.3; 24/51, 47% states; P<.001) and in the most protective states (mean 20.6, SD 5.7; 8/51, 16% states; P<.001). Finally, views to pages about common contraceptive methods significantly increased after the Dobbs decision. "Vasectomy" page views increased by 183% (P<.001), "IUD" (intrauterine device) page views increased by 80% (P<.001), "Combined oral contraceptive pill" page views increased by 24% (P<.001), "Emergency Contraception" page views increased by 224% (P<.001), and "Tubal ligation" page views increased by 92% (P<.001). CONCLUSIONS: People sought information on Wikipedia about abortion and contraception at increased rates after the Dobbs decision. Increased traffic to abortion-related Wikipedia articles correlated to the restrictiveness of state abortion policies. Increased interest in contraception-related pages reflects the increased demand for contraceptives observed after the Dobbs decision. Our work positions Wikipedia as an important source of reproductive health information and demands increased attention to maintain and improve Wikipedia as a reliable source of health information after the Dobbs decision.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.006 | 0.037 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.008 | 0.006 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.003 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Research integrity | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".