Journal of the Royal Society, Interface
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This article presents an interdisciplinary study of physical and social psychological effects on crowd dynamics based on a series of bottleneck experiments. Bottlenecks are of particular interest for applications such as crowd management and design of emergency routes because they limit the performance of a facility. In addition to previous work on the dynamics within the bottleneck, this study focuses on the dynamics in front of the bottleneck, more specifically, at entrances. ⋯ We show that the density of persons per square metre depends on motivation and also increases continuously with increasing corridor width, meaning that a density reduction can be achieved by a reduction of space. In comparison to other corridor widths observed, the narrowest corridor is rated as being fairer, more comfortable and as showing less unfair behaviour. Pushing behaviour is seen as ambivalent: it is rated as unfair and listed as a strategy for faster access.