London Bombings, July 7th 2005

The tragedy of the 7th July 2005 London bombings offered an opportunity for further testing of our hypotheses. In comparison to the earlier interview study, there would be less reliance on memories of distant events, and more comparability of experiences. Also, the availability in the media and internet of so many eye-witness accounts meant that we expected a much bigger dataset. Wegathered 141 newspaper accounts, more detailed secondary accounts (from websites, the GLA enquiry and magazines) from over 30 eye-witnesses, and a substantial primary data-set (14 e-mail accounts and 12 interviews).

See our report for user groups.

Publications:

Drury, J., Cocking, C., & Reicher, S. (2009). The nature of collective resilience: Survivor reactions to the 2005 London bombings. International Journal of Mass Emergencies and Disasters, 27, 66-95. 

Cocking, C. (2013). The role of “zero-responders” during 7/7: implications for the emergency services. International Journal of Emergency Services, 2(2), 79-93. 

Cocking, C., Drury, J. & Reicher, S. (2009). The psychology of crowd behaviour in emergency evacuations: Results from two interview studies and implications for the Fire & Rescue Services. Irish Journal of Psychology. Special Edition: Psychology and the Fire & Rescue Services, 30, 59-73.

Cocking, C., & Drury, J. (2008). The mass psychology of disasters and emergency evacuations: A research report and implications for the Fire and Rescue Service. Fire Safety, Technology and Management, 10, 13-19.

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