In an emergency, we'd rather follow the crowd than those right in front of us

Embargoed until: Publicly released: 2026-07-08 09:01

International

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A new study suggests we're likely to follow the most popular evacuation route rather than the ones we've just seen people take. About 380 people in the UK watched videos of computer-generated pedestrians in an emergency queuing and evacuating through one of two exits, then chose their own way out. On average, people favoured the one picked by more of the computer-generated evacuees, even when the latest evacuations were through the other - and when asked about their reasoning, many said this was a deliberate strategy. The authors say this provides a foundation for understanding group evacuations and crowd dynamics.

News release

From: The Royal Society

Picture a crowd of people leaving a building, walking in single file along a corridor. At the end of the corridor are two exits; one by one, they choose between them. How would you choose between these two exits? How are you influenced by what others do? We explored this question through a virtual experiment. On average, people followed the majority rather than relying on more recently observed choices and when asked about how they made their choice, they were aware of this. Our work sheds light onto mechanisms for sequential social decisions, a scenario humans and animals encounter routinely.

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Research The Royal Society, Web page URL after publication

Journal/
conference: Journal of the Royal Society Interface

Research:Paper

Organisation/s: Instituto de Productos Lacteos de Asturias (Spain), University of Leeds (UK)

Funder: This work was supported by UK Research and Innovation Future Leaders Fellowship (MR/S032525/1 and MR/X036863/1).

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