Abstract

Emergency information spreading in online social networks has played an important role in informing citizens and emergency management. However, there is still very little research on emergency information spreading in online social networks from emergency responders’ point of view. Here we address this challenge by modeling and simulation. We find that social network structure, behavior of informing and spreading, number and degree of initial spreading nodes have important and different effects on the performance of emergency information spreading in online social network. Taking fully into account these factors will improve understanding of how to use social media tools to support emergency response strategies.