The mass psychology of disasters and emergency evacuations: A research report and implications for practice

This review of the existing research literature, together with our own research, supports the view that mass panic is a myth, and that crowd behaviour in disasters and emergencies is meaningful rather than irrational; and that such behaviour is characteristically orderly and co-operative rather than disorderly and individualistic. The results of our studies add something new and original in the explanation of this process by suggesting that the basis of this co-operation is not (just) pre-existing affiliations and everyday social rules and roles, but an emergent sense of shared social identity arising from a shared relationship to the emergency itself.

Implications for the safe management of any future mass emergencies include the following:

• Those involved in the management of crowd safety need to be prepared – to plan for the worst case scenario; provide clear and easily available instructions for the public; and to regularly practice evacuation drills.
• Communication with the crowd is crucial. This in turn means prioritizing systems of communication (e.g. public address systems) over physical features such as exit widths, and providing alarm signals that are informative about the nature of the emergency. Crowds evacuate more effectively when trusted with information rather than treated as untrustworthy and prone to panic.
• Crowds evacuate more effectively when properly informed; the withholding of information is not only ineffective in the event itself but can lead to distrust subsequently.
• It is therefore crucial to build and maintain trust between the public and the crowd.
• Survivors and witnesses often volunteer to help during emergencies, and this could be a potentially useful resource to the emergency services.
• Over-protective responses from the government may stunt the public’s own natural resilience and resourcefulness.
• Since mass emergency evacuation behaviour is more effective the greater the shared identity in the crowd, appealing to crowd members’ collective spirit can encourage co-operative behaviour.
• Survivor self-help groups may have therapeutic benefits after the emergency.
• The inclusion of group-based behaviour in predictive computer models of crowd flow and crowd dynamics will help create more psychologically realistic models.