scholarly journals ‘Rationality’ in Collective Escape Behaviour: Identifying Reference Points of Measurement at Micro and Macro Levels

2019 ◽  
Vol 2019 ◽  
pp. 1-20 ◽  
Author(s):  
Milad Haghani ◽  
Majid Sarvi

Background. Evacuation behaviour of human crowds is often characterised by the notion of ‘irrational behaviour’. While the term has been frequently used in the literature, clear definitions and methods for measuring rationality do not exist. Objective. Here, we suggest that rationality, in this context, can alternatively and more effectively be formulated as a question of ‘optimal behaviour’. Decision optimality can potentially be measured and quantified. The main challenges, however, include (i) distinctly identifying the level at which we measure optimality, and (ii) identifying proper reference points at each level. Methods. We differentiate between optimality at the individual (i.e., micro) and the system (i.e., macro/aggregate) levels and illustrate how certain reference points can be established at each level. We suggest that, at the micro level, optimality of individual decisions can be quantified by comparing the outcome of each individual’s decision to those of their ‘nearly equal peers’. At the macro level, optimality can be measured by simulating the system using parametric numerical models and measuring the system performance while altering the behavioural parameters compared to their empirical estimates. Results. Having applied these methods, we observed that variation in micro level decision optimality rises rapidly as the space becomes more heavily crowded. As crowdedness increases in the environment, the difference between ‘good’ and ‘bad’ decisions becomes more distinct; and suboptimal decisions become more frequent. In other words, optimality at individual level seems to be moderated by the level of crowdedness. At the macro level, numerical simulations showed that, for certain exit attributes (like exit congestion), extreme marginal valuations (or preferences) were optimal, whereas for certain other attributes (like exit visibility), intermediate levels of valuation were closer to the optimal. In most cases, the natural observed (or estimated) tendency of evacuees (at the aggregate level) was not quite at the optimum level, meaning that the system could improve by modifying individuals’ marginal valuations of exit attributes. Applications and Recommendations. These results highlight the importance of guiding evacuation decisions particularly in heavily crowded spaces. They also theoretically illustrate the potential benefit of influencing/modifying people’s evacuation strategies, so they make decisions that are collectively more efficient. A crucial step to this end, however, is to identify what optimum strategy is and under what circumstances people are likelier to make suboptimal decisions.

Author(s):  
David Colander ◽  
Roland Kupers

This chapter tells the story of how macroeconomics developed as a separate field in an attempt to add aspects of complexity to the standard model with the aim of improving policy advice, but how those aspects of complexity were quickly lost it again. Instead of dealing with the macro economy as a complex system, macro economists focused on dotting is and crossing ts. The chapter begins by clarifying the difference between macroeconomics and microeconomics. Microeconomics builds a theory up from the individual elements—from the micro level to the macro level. It starts from assumptions of rational individuals and then analyzes how they would coordinate their actions, and what role the state should play in that coordination. Macroeconomics developed as a separate branch of economics when J. M. Keynes’s work was integrated into formal models in the 1930s and 1940s.


2019 ◽  
Vol 34 (1) ◽  
pp. 19-37 ◽  
Author(s):  
Franz Höllinger ◽  
Johanna Muckenhuber

In Sacred and Secular (2011 [2004]) Norris and Inglehart argued that improvements in material living conditions and higher degrees of existential security lead to a decline in religiousness both on the macro-level of the comparison between countries and on the individual level. Since then, a number of studies have examined this relationship and confirmed the assumptions of the existential security thesis. This article revisits this thesis using data from the sixth wave of the World Values Survey (2010–2014). The multi-level analysis reveals two key results. Consistent with previous studies, a strong correlation was found between better life conditions and lower levels of religiousness on the macro-level. Individual life conditions and threatening experiences, however, have only a very small impact on religiousness. Possible explanations for the discrepancy between macro-level and micro-level results are discussed in the final section.


Author(s):  
Barbara J. Risman

This chapter introduces the innovators and provides a portrait of them. The chapter analyzes these innovators at the individual, interactional, and macro level of the gender structure. The chapter begins at the individual level of analysis because these young people emphasize how they challenge gender by rejecting requirements to restrict their personal activities, goals, and personalities to femininity or masculinity. They refuse to live within gender stereotypes. These Millennials do not seem driven by their feminist ideological beliefs, although they do have them. Their worldviews are more taken for granted than central to their stories. Nor are they consistently challenging gender expectations for others, although they often ignore the gender expectations they face themselves. They innovate primarily in their personal lives, although they do reject gendered expectations at the interactional level and hold feminist ideological beliefs about gender equality.


Author(s):  
Barbara J. Risman

This is the first data chapter. In this chapter, respondents who are described as true believers in the gender structure, and essentialist gender differences are introduced and their interviews analyzed. They are true believers because, at the macro level, they believe in a gender ideology where women and men should be different and accept rules and requirements that enforce gender differentiation and even sex segregation in social life. In addition, at the interactional level, these Millennials report having been shaped by their parent’s traditional expectations and they similarly feel justified to impose gendered expectations on those in their own social networks. At the individual level, they have internalized masculinity or femininity, and embody it in how they present themselves to the world. They try hard to “do gender” traditionally.


2021 ◽  
pp. 147737082199685
Author(s):  
Jacek Bieliński ◽  
Andreas Hövermann

Institutional anomie theory (IAT) describes the potentially criminogenic impact of economically dominated social institutions. Although originally cast at the macro level of society, more efforts have emerged lately to capture the IAT framework on the individual level, resulting in a need for appropriate measures representing the presumed marketization processes. Our study addresses this need by offering a theoretically derived, comprehensive measure of the individual-level instantiation of an anomic culture depicted in IAT, that is, ‘marketized mentality’. Structural equation models testing for the single higher-order factor marketized mentality are calculated with a representative random sample of Poland’s population. Finally, the implications and limitations resulting from the analyses are discussed.


2017 ◽  
Vol 52 ◽  
pp. 43-58 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kaarina S. Reini ◽  
Jan Saarela

Previous research has documented lower disability retirement and mortality rates of Swedish speakers as compared with Finnish speakers in Finland. This paper is the first to compare the two language groups with regard to the receipt of sickness allowance, which is an objective health measure that reflects a less severe poor health condition. Register-based data covering the years 1988-2011 are used. We estimate logistic regression models with generalized estimating equations to account for repeated observations at the individual level. We find that Swedish-speaking men have approximately 30 percent lower odds of receiving sickness allowance than Finnish-speaking men, whereas the difference in women is about 15 percent. In correspondence with previous research on all-cause mortality at working ages, we find no language-group difference in sickness allowance receipt in the socially most successful subgroup of the population.


Author(s):  
Greger Henriksson ◽  
Minna Räsänen

This chapter is based on the assumption that keeping the number and length of business and commuting trips at reasonable levels could contribute to reaching targets of environmental sustainability. The authors highlight a couple of options for reducing or avoiding business trips and commuting through workplace location or improved use of communications. They present case studies concerning travel and communications, carried out by using diaries and interviews. They also present relevant literature on social practices and sustainability goals in relation to use of ICT. The aim is to shed light on variation in the use of travel and communications on an individual level in work life. The case studies illustrate that such variation is mainly due to the concrete practices involved in execution of professional duties and roles. Duties that involve a clearly defined end result or product being delivered regularly by the member of staff are correlated to clearly defined needs for communications. Less clearly defined end results of the work duties seem to make it harder for the individual to plan and perform communication and travel in a more energy saving way. The difference in professional duties can thus be expressed in terms of clarity and maturity. Another factor that affect who can replace travel with ICTs is relations of power, e.g., when a purchaser dictates the terms for a subcontractor concerning how and where to “deliver” his working time, service or product. The importance of clarity, maturity and power aspects means that professional practices need to be studied at a detailed level to find out who could substitute ICTs for travel and how this could be done.


Teen Spirit ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 132-143
Author(s):  
Paul Howe

This chapter assesses how the pervasive influence of the adolescent character provides insight into the workings of another sector of modern life relevant to us all: the economy. Less of a collective undertaking than politics, economic activity is guided primarily by individual decisions and actions in the free market system; so many of the relevant effects are seen first and foremost at the individual level. But these individual effects can multiply and cascade to generate patterns that do have important consequences for the general economic and social fabric. Emotions, misperceptions, intangible costs and benefits, influenced in many instances by underlying character traits, lead people to act in ways that the traditional models do not anticipate. As in other fields, it is only recently that some researchers have started to link personality to economic behavior in interesting and enlightening ways to dig deeper into what makes people tick when it comes to economic decision making and activity. When we combine some of these findings with ideas about the changing contours of character in the adolescent society, we can develop new understandings of some of the more salient economic trends of the past number of years.


2018 ◽  
Vol 13 (10) ◽  
pp. 1273-1280 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mathieu Lacome ◽  
Ben Simpson ◽  
Nick Broad ◽  
Martin Buchheit

Purpose: To examine the ability of multivariate models to predict the heart-rate (HR) responses to some specific training drills from various global positioning system (GPS) variables and to examine the usefulness of the difference in predicted vs actual HR responses as an index of fitness or readiness to perform. Method: All data were collected during 1 season (2016–17) with players’ soccer activity recorded using 5-Hz GPS and internal load monitored using HR. GPS and HR data were analyzed during typical small-sided games and a 4-min standardized submaximal run (12 km·h−1). A multiple stepwise regression analysis was used to identify which combinations of GPS variables showed the largest correlations with HR responses at the individual level (HRACT, 149 [46] GPS/HR pairs per player) and was further used to predict HR during individual drills (HRPRED). Then, HR predicted was compared with actual HR to compute an index of fitness or readiness to perform (HRΔ, %). The validity of HRΔ was examined while comparing changes in HRΔ with the changes in HR responses to a submaximal run (HRRUN, fitness criterion) and as a function of the different phases of the season (with fitness being expected to increase after the preseason). Results: HRPRED was very largely correlated with HRACT (r = .78 [.04]). Within-player changes in HRΔ were largely correlated with within-player changes in HRRUN (r = .66, .50–.82). HRΔ very likely decreased from July (3.1% [2.0%]) to August (0.8% [2.2%]) and most likely decreased further in September (−1.5% [2.1%]). Conclusions: HRΔ is a valid variable to monitor elite soccer players’ fitness and allows fitness monitoring on a daily basis during normal practice, decreasing the need for formal testing.


2015 ◽  
Vol 10 (11) ◽  
pp. 83 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Cocco ◽  
Majdi Quttainah

<p>Several individuals from top management seem to be confused about the difference between creativity and innovativeness. Amabile (1997) suggests that while innovation begins with creative ideas, creativity by individuals and teams is only a starting point for innovation. Individual creativity is necessary but not sufficient to yield breakthrough innovation in organizations. This can sometimes cause confusion in employee development efforts and actions taken by management. Companies often look for ways to hire and retain creative employees and at the same time they are also interested in establishing a creative environment for knowledge workers… but should creativity be the primary focus? These firms hope that creativity enhancing steps will eventually lead to greater innovation and therefore help it to achieve sustained competitive advantage. This paper attempts to demonstrate that there are potentially other dimensions beyond creativity related to innovativeness, which should be considered at the individual level in order to foster innovation in firms. Empirical results in this study support the idea that intrinsic motivational orientation, sociability and political astuteness are enhancers to employee innovativeness while perfection seeking behavior detracts employee innovativeness. These findings may serve to extend Amabile’s (1997) componential framework to center on the “innovativeness” construct versus creativity to help explain how firms need to hire, cultivate and retain the right talent.</p>


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document