Originally Posted By: Tjin
Our brains don't jump into the flee reflex until the last moment. Although that can be a good thing, as most will act rationally first, but a little too slow then they should.

Not exactly accurate. After the initial "What its it?" or "orienting reflex (OR)", the automatic response is fight/flee/freeze (FFF). That's probably 400 milliseconds. To do anything else requires higher cortical functioning, and takes a moment. So no... our brains do not jump into the flee reflex at the last moment... they jump into it at the first moment.

Originally Posted By: Tjin
You need to prime your brains by training. People who are used to thinking and acting quickly, be in sports of work, have an edge on this. Getting into a realistic evacuation drill on a plane is hard. But you can run the steps you need to take to evacuate the plane, front or backside, in your head.


Yes and no: One has to be trained to quickly overcome the FFF response and THEN do something else/better. When individuals appear to NOT FFF, what's really happening is that they suppress that FFF behavior so very quickly, and move to the "something else" so very quickly, that it appears they do not have the FFF. But they do. You can not learn to do this with any mental rehearsal alone. Significant training is needed to teach someone to suppress their FFF quickly after the OR trigger. And it has to happen in the presence of a trigger or something very similar to the actual trigger... it can't be training all in your head.

I see no way to train the average airline public to overcome the FFF and behave more in line with airline attendant's instructions. In part I believe that's why they (in some airline training) are trained to scream in unison the same cues: "get out...get out.. leave your luggage...get out ...get out" The hope is to derail the passenger's luggage behavior and cue them to do the right thing... get out.