Journal article
Command and control in emergency services operations: a social network analysis
Ergonomics, Vol.49(12-13), pp.1204-1225
2006
Abstract
There is increasing interest in the use of social network analysis as a tool to study the performance of teams and organizations. In this paper, processes of command and control in the emergency services are explored from the perspective of social network theory. We report a set of network analyses (comprising visualization, a selection of mathematical metrics, and a discussion of procedures) based on the observation of six emergency service incidents: three fire service operations involving the treatment of hazardous chemicals, and three police operations involving immediate response to emergency calls. The findings are discussed in terms of our attempts to categorize the network structures against a set of extant command and control network archetypes and the relationship between those structures; comments on the qualities the networks display are put into the contexts of the incidents reported. We suggest that social network analysis may have a valuable part to play in the general study of command and control.
Details
- Title
- Command and control in emergency services operations: a social network analysis
- Authors
- R J Houghton (Author) - University of Birmingham, United KingdomC Baber (Author) - University of Birmingham, United KingdomR McMaster (Author) - University of Birmingham, United KingdomNeville A Stanton (Author) - Brunel University, United KingdomPaul M Salmon (Author) - Brunel University, United KingdomR Stewart (Author) - Cranfield University, United KingdomGuy H Walker (Author) - Brunel University, United Kingdom
- Publication details
- Ergonomics, Vol.49(12-13), pp.1204-1225
- Publisher
- Taylor & Francis Ltd.
- Date published
- 2006
- DOI
- 10.1080/00140130600619528
- ISSN
- 0014-0139; 0014-0139
- Copyright note
- This is an electronic version of an article published in Robert J. Houghton , Chris Baber , Richard McMaster , Neville A. Stanton , Paul Salmon , Rebecca Stewart & Guy Walker (2006) Command and control in emergency services operations: a social network analysis, Ergonomics, 49:12-13, 1204-1225, DOI: 10.1080/00140130600619528 . Ergonomics is available online at: http://www.tandfonline.com/openurl?genre=article&issn=0014-0139&volume=49&issue=12-13&spage=1204
- Organisation Unit
- Centre for Human Factors and Systems Science; University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland; School of Law and Society
- Language
- English
- Record Identifier
- 99450302502621
- Output Type
- Journal article
- Research Statement
- false
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- Collaboration types
- Domestic collaboration
- Web Of Science research areas
- Engineering, Industrial
- Ergonomics
- Psychology
- Psychology, Applied