Modelling Individual Evacuation Decisions during Natural Disasters: A Case Study of Volcanic Crisis in Merapi, Indonesia
Authored by Alison Heppenstall, Jumadi, Nick S Malleson, Steve J Carver, Duncan J Quincey, Vern R Manville
Date Published: 2018
DOI: 10.3390/geosciences8060196
Sponsors:
No sponsors listed
Platforms:
No platforms listed
Model Documentation:
ODD
Flow charts
Model Code URLs:
Model code not found
Abstract
As the size of human populations increases, so does the severity of the
impacts of natural disasters. This is partly because more people are now
occupying areas which are susceptible to hazardous natural events,
hence, evacuation is needed when such events occur. Evacuation can be
the most important action to minimise the impact of any disaster, but in
many cases there are always people who are reluctant to leave. This
paper describes an agent-based model (ABM) of evacuation decisions,
focusing on the emergence of reluctant people in times of crisis and
using Merapi, Indonesia as a case study. The individual evacuation
decision model is influenced by several factors formulated from a
literature review and survey. We categorised the factors influencing
evacuation decisions into two opposing forces, namely, the driving
factors to leave (evacuate) versus those to stay, to formulate the
model. The evacuation decision (to stay/leave) of an agent is based on
an evaluation of the strength of these driving factors using
threshold-based rules. This ABM was utilised with a synthetic population
from census microdata, in which everyone is characterised by the
decision rule. Three scenarios with varying parameters are examined to
calibrate the model. Validations were conducted using a retrodictive
approach by performing spatial and temporal comparisons between the
outputs of simulation and the real data. We present the results of the
simulations and discuss the outcomes to conclude with the most plausible
scenario.
Tags
Agent-based model
Agent-based models
vulnerability
Evacuation model
synthetic population
Cellular-automata
Hazards
Risk perception
Evacuation decision
Risk
perception model
Volcanic hazard
Merapi
Energy technology adoption
Rain-triggered lahars
Central java
Synthetic populations
Community
resilience
Eruption
Deposits
Community resilience