Panic, Irrationality, and Herding: Three Ambiguous Terms in Crowd Dynamics Research

Table 1

Reduced comments on the term panic and their frequency among the original quotes.

No.	Comment	Frq.	Discipline			Study type
			Soc.	Phys.	Bio.	Mod.	Emp. Test.	Conc.
1	Panic is common occurrence in the face of imminent danger	4	1	3	0	3	1	0
2	Panic is a very pervasive assumption in modelling literature	6	6	0	0	0	1	6
3	Panic is rare occurrence in the face of imminent danger	1	0	1	0	1	0	0
4	Panic is a cause of injuries in crises	13	3	10	0	7	2	6
5	Panic can affect evacuation efficiency, in both beneficial or detrimental ways	1	0	1	0	1	0	0
6	Panic can affect evacuation efficiency	7	1	6	0	4	0	3
7	Panic is manifested as random (erratic) behaviour (chaos)	4	1	3	0	2	0	2
8	Panic is manifested as increased stress (nervousness/fear)	6	2	4	0	4	1	4
9	Panic is manifested as imitative (herd) behaviour	7	1	6	0	7	1	2
10	Panic is manifested as elevated physical competition	9	1	8	0	8	0	3
11	Panic is manifested as non-humanistic behaviour	5	4	1	0	0	1	4
12	Panic can occur without any distinguishable cause	1	0	1	0	1	0	0
13	Panic lacks a clear definition	12	11	1	0	1	4	11
14	Panic is common media language	6	5	1	0	1	2	5
15	Panic can be represented by simple parameters in simulation models	4	0	4	0	4	0	1
16	Panic theory lacks empirical support	27	22	5	0	4	10	23
17	Panic leads to imbalanced utilisation of exits	3	1	2	0	0	0	3
18	Panic leads to exit blockages	6	0	6	0	6	0	2
19	There are various kinds of panic	4	2	2	0	2	2	4
20	Social affiliation theory presents an alternative to the panic theory	7	7	0	0	0	2	6
21	Panic theory has significant implications for crowd management	3	3	0	0	0	0	3
22	What seems to be panic behaviour, may be individual’s best perceived course of action	2	2	0	0	0	0	2

“Frq.” indicates frequency.
“Soc.”, “Phys.”, and “Bio.”, respectively, indicate social sciences, physical sciences. and biological sciences.
“Mod.”, “Emp. Test.”, and “Conc.”, respectively, indicate modelling, empirical testing, and conceptualisation.