% IMPORTANT: The following is UTF-8 encoded. This means that in the presence
% of non-ASCII characters, it will not work with BibTeX 0.99 or older.
% Instead, you should use an up-to-date BibTeX implementation like “bibtex8” or
% “biber”.
@ARTICLE{Lgering:1005592,
author = {Lügering, Helena and Tepeli, Aysel Dilek and Sieben, Anna},
title = {{I}t’s (not) just a matter of terminology: {E}veryday
understanding of “mass panic” and alternative terms},
journal = {Safety science},
volume = {163},
issn = {0925-7535},
address = {Amsterdam [u.a.]},
publisher = {Elsevier Science},
reportid = {FZJ-2023-01551},
pages = {106123},
year = {2023},
abstract = {Although the idea of mass panic is quite common in reports
on accidents involving crowds, most experts consider it to
be erroneous. In a nutshell, they argue that panic and
animalistic behavior of humans are not the main causes of
crowd accidents, but that it is rather an organizational
issue. However, few of the existing studies have addressed
the question of what lay people associate with the term.
With our mixed-method study, we sought to shed light on
people’s underlying ideas and assumptions about mass
panic. Additionally, we were interested in how these ideas
change using two alternative terms, namely “mass
accident” and “mass disaster”. Results showed that
participants in the questionnaire (N = 282) and interview (N
= 17) study indeed strongly associated the term “mass
panic” with irrational and selfish behavior, and less with
orderly behavior. In addition to the organizers, people in
the crowd were seen as responsible for such accidents.
Besides, most actions judged appropriate to defuse the
situation were related to the advice “Don’t panic”.
Deviating from the concept, however, it was indicated that
helping behavior can be found in critical situations. The
questionnaire in which participants only saw one of the
three terms revealed no change in the everyday understanding
with the alternative terms. Nevertheless, interviewees found
their own “mass panic explanation” insufficient but also
had no alternative ideas of what causes such accidents.
Therefore, replacing the problematic concept of mass panic
requires not only alternative terms, but also the
dissemination of scientific explanations.},
cin = {IAS-7},
ddc = {610},
cid = {I:(DE-Juel1)IAS-7-20180321},
pnm = {5111 - Domain-Specific Simulation $\&$ Data Life Cycle Labs
(SDLs) and Research Groups (POF4-511) / CrowdDNA -
TECHNOLOGIES FOR COMPUTER-ASSISTED CROWD MANAGEMENT
(899739)},
pid = {G:(DE-HGF)POF4-5111 / G:(EU-Grant)899739},
typ = {PUB:(DE-HGF)16},
UT = {WOS:001055032000001},
doi = {10.1016/j.ssci.2023.106123},
url = {https://juser.fz-juelich.de/record/1005592},
}