The psychology of incident command: decision making trials

摘要

The Chief Fire Officers Association (CFOA) has a clear focus on operational effectiveness, recognising the benefits of improving our understanding of the factors that influence command decisions. The operational environment can be inherently dangerous, so the quality of the decisions that are made have a direct impact on both public and firefighter safety. It is therefore critically important that incident commanders are well prepared to make decisions in the highly challenging operational environment. This CFOA-led research builds on the previous work that informed the Incident Command National Operational Guidance, which for the first time saw decisions being analysed at actual operational incidents (as featured in the August/September issue of FIRE). CFOA are progressing further work into how such knowledge can be practically applied, with close support from the School of Psychology at Cardiff University.