Int. J. Emergency Management, Vol. X, No. Y, xxxx 1 Copyright © 200x Inderscience Enterprises Ltd. A discussion of decision making applied in incident command Ove Njå* Faculty of Technology and Natural Science University of Stavanger N-4036 Stavanger, Norway E-mail: ove.njaa@uis.no *Corresponding author Eivind L. Rake Faculty of Technology and Natural Science University of Stavanger N-4036 Stavanger, Norway and Fire Department South-Rogaland, Stavanger, Norway E-mail: eivind.rake@brannsr.no Abstract: Rescuers respond to unique emergency situations. Decision making on the scene of an accident is context-bound, embedded in ever-changing environments. Thus, decisions in action sometimes involve huge uncertainty. This paper discusses decision making as part of incident management, as presented in the research literature. Two main theoretical perspectives on decision making in crises are compared. The Naturalistic Decision Making (NDM) and Contingent Decision Path perspectives show the similarities and differences in on-scene crisis decision making. In the light of prevailing crisis management research, we conclude that the researcher faces several challenges. Assumptions about experiences, situation awareness, cognitive reasoning and the reconstruction of on-scene behaviour are not easily retrieved. There is a need to develop a better understanding of and methods for rigorous observation and knowledge elicitation of decision making in crisis settings. Keywords: incident command; crisis management; decision making; naturalistic decision making, contingency approach. Reference to this paper should be made as follows: Njå, O. and Rake, E.L. (xxxx) ‘A discussion of decision making applied in incident command’, Int. J. Emergency Management, Vol. X, No. Y, pp.000–000. Biographical notes: Ove Njå, PhD, is an Associate Professor at the Faculty of Technology and Natural Science, University of Stavanger, Norway. His doctoral thesis concerned safety management and emergency preparedness planning. His main research topics are risk and uncertainty, emergency response performance, societal safety and risk management. He is also a Senior Researcher at the International Research Institute of Stavanger.