The Influence of National Culture on Evacuation Response Behaviour and Time: An Agent-Based Approach

Abstract

Abstract“How does culture, in combination with cues, settings and affiliation, influence response-phase behaviour and time and total evacuation time?”. A questionnaire and an agent-based model for a case study of a library evacuation in Czech Republic, Poland, Turkey and the UK have been developed to answer this question. Our questionnaire, conducted among 442 respondents (N = 105 from Czech Republic, N = 106 from Poland, N = 106 from Turkey and N = 125 from the United Kingdom), shows significant differences in the number of performed response tasks per culture - whereby Turkish respondents perform the most response tasks and British the least - and the results were directly implemented in our agent-based model. Simulation results show: (1) these differences - in combination with emergent effects for task choice and agent interactions - directly translate into the average response and evacuation times being highest for Turkey, followed by Poland, Czech Republic, and the UK, (2) cues, setting and affiliation influence response and evacuation time - such as being informed by staff giving a negative correlation and evacuating in groups a positive correlation with response time -, while the magnitude of these effects differ per culture. Our results suggest that faster response times might be related to dimensions of national culture, such as weak uncertainty avoidance and high individualism.KeywordsEvacuation response behaviourAgent-based modelCross-culturalEvacuation modelling