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Related Experiment Video

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Experimental Research Examining How People Can Cope with Uncertainty Through Soft Haptic Sensations

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Assessing Mental Models of Emergencies Through Two Knowledge Elicitation Tasks.

Daphne E Whitmer¹, Valerie K Sims¹, Michael E Torres¹

¹University of Central Florida, Orlando.

|October 21, 2016

Summary

Understanding emergency mental models is key to improving warning adherence. This study found that people’s perception of risk and emergency situations influences whether they follow protective actions.

Keywords:

decision-making knowledge representation risk assessment safety warnings

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Using the Threat Probability Task to Assess Anxiety and Fear During Uncertain and Certain Threat

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Area of Science:

Cognitive Psychology
Risk Communication
Emergency Management

Background:

Many individuals do not follow recommendations in emergency warnings.
Previous research has not adequately explored the cognitive processes influencing emergency decision-making.

Purpose of the Study:

To evaluate risk identification within mental models using standard elicitation techniques.
To investigate the relationship between university campus alerts and these mental models.

Main Methods:

Study 1: Analyzed two years of emergency alerts from a southeastern university.
Study 2: Participants listed perceived emergencies in a thought-listing task.
Study 3: Measured the time taken by participants to classify situations as emergencies.

Main Results:

University alerts focused on armed persons, theft, and fire.
Participant-listed emergencies included fire, car accidents, heart attacks, and theft.
Participants rapidly identified bombs, murder, fire, tornadoes, and rape as emergencies, but slowly identified suspicious packages and identity theft.

Conclusions:

Individuals must perceive a situation as serious to categorize it as an emergency and act on warnings.
Adherence to emergency warnings is only somewhat linked to current mental models.
Understanding mental representations of emergencies is crucial for addressing ignored warnings.