Study Finds Correlation Between Kinneret Water Level And Hype Over Kinneret Water Level

“We found an inverse relationship between the Kinneret level and news coverage of the Kinneret level.”

Tiberias, February 9 – A groundbreaking study has found a close relationship between the measured depth of Lake Kinneret and the extent to which environmental organizations and the news media voice alarm over the lake’s water level.

An article in this month’s issue of Nature details the striking correlation between the two data sets. Avi Uss, the study’s lead author, wrote that his team of Haifa University graduate students monitored the Kinneret – also known as the Sea of Galilee – level and the level of alarm in ecologically-minded media sources over the course of two months, and discovered a phenomenon they claim has never before been described: a direct correlation between the two. If borne out by further studies, the team has hit upon a connection that may play a key role in understanding the environment and how it affects certain inhabitants of that environment.

“We found an inverse relationship between the Kinneret level and news coverage of the Kinneret level,” wrote Uss. “That is to say, as the water level in the Kinneret drops to the vicinity of -213 meters below Sea Level, attention to that so-called Lower Red Line increases, and as the water level rises beyond -213 meters, news coverage and ecological pronouncements decrease.” He noted that the phenomenon has been observed not only for the December 2016-January 2017 period , but that preliminary indications point to the relationship as consistent with an annual pattern.

“Further study is warranted, and we encourage others to join us in this exploration,” he continued. “A note of caution must be sounded, however, because correlation does not automatically imply causation. It may be that the water levels prompt changes in the news coverage; it may be that news coverage causes the water levels to change; or a third, as-yet-unidentified phenomenon may lie behind both phenomena.”

The team plans to continue studying the emerging phenomenological correlation through the winter months and into spring, and into next year, if funding allows. “We can only speculate as to the relationship between the Upper Red Line, higher than which the Degania Dam to the Jordan River is opened, and media coverage,” the article concluded. “It would be unwise to draw conclusions without the necessary data. Tentatively, we can posit that it will be possible with an increase in precipitation, as our other observations indicate a potential correlation between the amount of rainfall and snowfall in the general vicinity and the rate at which the Kinneret water level changes.”

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