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@ARTICLE{Haghani:864575,
author = {Haghani, Milad and Cristiani, Emiliano and Bode, Nikolai W.
F. and Boltes, Maik and Corbetta, Alessandro},
title = {{P}anic, {I}rrationality, and {H}erding: {T}hree
{A}mbiguous {T}erms in {C}rowd {D}ynamics {R}esearch},
journal = {Journal of advanced transportation},
volume = {2019},
issn = {2042-3195},
address = {London},
publisher = {Hindawi},
reportid = {FZJ-2019-04294},
pages = {1 - 58},
year = {2019},
abstract = {Background. The three terms “panic”,
“irrationality”, and “herding” are ubiquitous in the
crowd dynamics literature and have a strong influence on
both modelling and management practices. The terms are also
commonly shared between the scientific and nonscientific
domains. The pervasiveness of the use of these terms is to
the point where their underlying assumptions have often been
treated as common knowledge by both experts and lay persons.
Yet, at the same time, the literature on crowd dynamics
presents ample debate, contradiction, and inconsistency on
these topics. Method. This review is the first to
systematically revisit these three terms in a unified study
to highlight the scope of this debate. We extracted from
peer-reviewed journal articles direct quotes that offer a
definition, conceptualisation, or supporting/contradicting
evidence on these terms and/or their underlying theories. To
further examine the suitability of the term herding, a
secondary and more detailed analysis is also conducted on
studies that have specifically investigated this phenomenon
in empirical settings. Results. The review shows that (i)
there is no consensus on the definition for the terms panic
and irrationality and that (ii) the literature is highly
divided along discipline lines on how accurate these
theories/terminologies are for describing human escape
behaviour. The review reveals a complete division and
disconnection between studies published by social scientists
and those from the physical science domain and also between
studies whose main focus is on numerical simulation versus
those with empirical focus. (iii) Despite the ambiguity of
the definitions and the missing consensus in the literature,
these terms are still increasingly and persistently
mentioned in crowd evacuation studies. (iv) Different to
panic and irrationality, there is relative consistency in
definitions of the term herding, with the term usually being
associated with ‘(blind) imitation’. However, based on
the findings of empirical studies, we argue why, despite the
relative consistency in meaning, (v) the term herding itself
lacks adequate nuance and accuracy for describing the role
of ‘social influence’ in escape behaviour. Our
conclusions also emphasise the importance of distinguishing
between the social influence on various aspects of
evacuation behaviour and avoiding generalisation across
various behavioural layers. Conclusions. We argue that the
use of these three terms in the scientific literature does
not contribute constructively to extending the knowledge or
to improving the modelling capabilities in the field of
crowd dynamics. This is largely due to the ambiguity of
these terms, the overly simplistic nature of their
assumptions, or the fact that the theories they represent
are not readily verifiable. Recommendations. We suggest that
it would be beneficial for advancing this research field
that the phenomena related to these three terms are clearly
defined by more tangible and quantifiable terms and be
formulated as verifiable hypotheses, so they can be
operationalized for empirical testing.},
cin = {IAS-7},
ddc = {380},
cid = {I:(DE-Juel1)IAS-7-20180321},
pnm = {511 - Computational Science and Mathematical Methods
(POF3-511)},
pid = {G:(DE-HGF)POF3-511},
typ = {PUB:(DE-HGF)16},
UT = {WOS:000481916600001},
doi = {10.1155/2019/9267643},
url = {https://juser.fz-juelich.de/record/864575},
}