How to Survive a Disaster

You do not need to have any special or amazing set of skills to survive a disaster, you just need to know what to do. Many of the deaths that occur in disasters are completely avoidable, but they occur because “75% of people thrown into a life-threatening situation” are so bewildered by what is happening that they are unable to think clearly and act in the correct manner to escape to save their own life. Many people are said to be frozen by fear of the situation, they become “mentally paralyzed” unable to act. On the other hand 15% of people are able to remain calm and think clearly to make the correct decisions to save their life. The remaining 10% hinder the survival chances of everyone else by acting irrationally. This is shocking to me that only 15% of people can act in the correct manner to save their own life.

When engineers design evacuation procedures for buildings they believe that people will respond immediately but this is not the case. For example during the plane attack of the Twin Towers on 9/11 many of the people did not even start to evacuate until 45 minutes after the alarms started going off. People were gathered in groups talking about what was happening, some people resumed their normal daily routine finishing up emails or working on projects, one person was even reported to have changed into their biking clothes to start on their way home. If they had followed the safety emergency plan and started to evacuate right away many of the deaths could have been avoided. Many people when a disaster occurs have trouble getting comfortable so they resume their normal activities to try and attain any amount of comfort.

Survivalist behavior is very goal-oriented, “if you are hungry you look for food, if you feel isolated, you seek companionship.” In a disaster it is difficult to ignore those feelings and to act and find the exit. In an emergency your brain becomes overwhelmed by all of the incoming stimuli before we can properly assess the situation and decide on the right decision. One way to override the wrong decisions is to make the correct actions automation through rigorous practice so it becomes second nature. In every new situation make sure to find the directions of the proper emergency plan, whether it be in a hotel, a movie theater, or at work. In a disaster there will always be things you cannot control, such as the 10% of people that are detrimental to others survival in an emergency situation. However in most situations groups are more cooperative rather than hindering each other’s survival.

If you were to ask a stranger if they saw someone being attacked in public while there were many other people around if they would do anything, they would of course say yes of course they would help. However, this is not always the case. The bystander effect proves that the more people there are that witness an attack, the more the individual responsibility is diffused. Everyone figures that someone else will do something.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/fulfillment-any-age/201103/when-disaster-strikes-others-how-your-brain-responds

 http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20150128-how-to-survive-a-disaster

http://www.udallas.edu/udjs/departments/psychology/2013-2014/survival-psychology.html