- Author
- Zmud, M.
- Title
- Public Perceptions of High-Rise Building Safety and Emergency Evacuation Procedures Research Project. Final Report.
- Coporate
- NuStats, Auston, TX
- Report
- Final Report, July 2007, 55 p.
- Keywords
- high rise buildings | fire safety | evacuation | emergencies | emergency plans | surveys | residential buildings | commercial buildings | questionnaires | planning | prefire planning | human behavior | occupants | fire drills
- Identifiers
- geographic distribution; building parameters; basic knowledge of emergency preparedness and building evacuation readiness; perceptions of likely behaviors during an emergency situation or building evacuations; opinions about emergency preparedness and building evacuation readiness; demographics
- Abstract
- The National Fire Protection Association commissioned NuStats, LLC, to conduct the Public Perceptions of High-Rise Building Safety and Emergency Evacuation Procedures survey. The survey was conducted among 244 residential building occupants located in Chicago, New York City, and San Francisco, and 228 commercial building occupants located in Boston, Chicago, Detroit, Houston, Los Angeles, Miami, and Philadelphia. The margin of error is ±6.4 percent for the residential occupant survey and ±6.6 percent for the commercial occupant survey. The survey explored the following: (*) General knowledge of high-rise building safety and emergency evacuation procedures, (*) Attitudes and perceptions about high-rise safety and emergency evacuation procedures, and (*) Factors, such as personal evacuation experience, which contribute to the knowledge, attitudes and perceptions about high-rise safety and emergency evacuation procedures. One of the major hypotheses of the research was the belief among life safety professionals that perceptions about how occupants might respond to emergency situations in buildings has changed, largely in light of the events of September 11, 2001, and that current assumptions about occupant behavior in this regard may no longer be valid. NFP A technical committees and others will use the results of the study to develop more appropriate occupant notification and communication strategies and to build evacuation and occupant relocation strategies, emergency responder strategies, and education programs and messages.