1. In the footage from Oxford Street,
many people are looking where they are going,
assessing the situation, or otherwise moving in an
orderly way, or standing around etc. Only a few people scream.
2. Research evidence
on emergency evacuations shows that coordination and order is common.
Pushing and trampling occurs rarely and tends to be in narrow exits that
are unfamiliar. Coordination reduces when people don’t see themselves
as a ‘we’ or ‘us’.
3. It is not
clear that the number of injuries reported is particularly high for the number
of people involved.
4. Research on fires
shows that people often underestimate danger and/ or delay their exit (to
respond, to stay with others). This, not over-reaction,
is a main cause of fatalities.
5. Research
shows that there isn’t indiscriminate ‘contagion’.
People attend most to, and follow the example of, those they judge to be
relevant for the context, who are often people they define as similar to self.
6. The word
‘panic’ was common in the news accounts, but researchers reject the term because
it is hard to evidence.
7. What is
gained by saying ‘panic’ (rather than 'fleeing') is the implication that the
behaviour is an overreaction, is unreasonable. But what should
people do when the information they have is that there is a threat? ‘Sudden fear’
or ‘fleeing’ are more neutral terms.
8. Journalists
seemed to describe responses as ‘panic’ because it wasn’t after all a real
emergency; but in many real emergencies people
don’t know whether it is real or not (including fires and terrorist
attacks).
9. A first
irony of the journalists’ use of the term ‘panic’ for the public response is
that the government’s advice is to
‘run’ (this is not necessarily an endorsement).
10. A second
irony is that the image of a vulnerable panic-prone public, rather than collectively
resilient, is precisely what ISIS and others seek to achieve.
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