Are we sheep? an examination of victims fighting and fleeing in mass shootings

Abstract

Since the Aurora Theater and Sandy Hook Elementary School incidences, mass shootings have recently gained popularity in discussion circles, in particular, ways to prevent mass shootings. Yet, the discussion neglects the unwarranted mass casualties in mass shootings. The purposes of this study were to test the fight-or-flight response by relating the number of deaths and injuries to fighting and fleeing for victims, and by comparing fighting and fleeing in terms of the number of deaths and injuries for victims in mass shootings. Ninety-two cases between 1966 and 2012 were obtained from the New York City Police Department's 2012 edition of Active Shooter: Recommendations and Analysis for Risk Mitigation. The reactions of victims were reviewed with 307 newspaper and magazine articles acquired from LexisNexis Academic, Academic Search Complete, and Google Search. The number of deaths was fairly lower than the number of injuries. Twenty-two percent of the victims fought the assailant, whereas 78% of the victims fled. The number of deaths and the number of injuries were positively correlated and statistically significant. The number of deaths and victim response were negatively correlated and not statistically significant. Equally, the number of injuries and victim response were negatively correlated and not statistically significant. No difference was found in the number of deaths between victim responses. In contrast, there was a significant difference found in the number of injuries between victim responses. Results of this study suggested that fighting is the better measure against the assailant. Suggestions for further research are also included.