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“Of all the shortages we have – there’s a gasoline shortage – you know what else is disappearing from the supermarket shelves?” a television presenter jokes. “Toilet paper.”

Shops emptied of loo roll are now linked to the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, but that line was delivered by the US late-night host Johnny Carson more than 50 years ago.

It was December 1973, two months after the outbreak of the Yom Kippur War, which triggered an energy crisis that would lead to a quadrupling of global oil prices.

Carson’s jokey The Tonight Show segment on a potential toilet paper shortage set off a bout of US panic buying that, ironically, led to actual shortages. It was described at the time as “a rumour run wild in a nation that has recently become geared to expect shortages in items considered absolute necessities”.

The oil shocks of the 1970s – which led to fuel rationing in countries like Australia, the UK, the US and France – saw consumers stockpile petrol as well as other goods such as canning lids and gold, in reaction to reported shortages. A decade earlier, faced with the possibility of nuclear war during the 1962 Cuban missile crisis, US families had stockpiled canned goods and bottled water in basements.

Panic buying in times of crisis or natural disaster is well documented – from the first and second world wars to shortages of food, medicine and hand sanitiser during Covid-19. Research points to a variety of factors – both psychological and circumstantial – that drive people to stockpile in times of perceived scarcity.

But when that feared scarcity is unfounded rather than genuine, panic buying can – in a self-fulling prophecy – create the very shortages the behaviour is intended to insulate against.

Telling people not to panic leads to panic

Panic buying of fuel has been noted in numerous countries in recent weeks, with reports of some petrol stations in Australia running out of supply and long queues of vehicles waiting to fill up.

Present concerns are understandable: Iran’s effective closure of the strait of Hormuz, in response to the US and Israeli bombing, has cut off 20% of the global oil supply, driving crude oil prices above US$100 a barrel. In Australia, fuel prices have increased by about 40% since the start of the war.

“When things are perceived to be in low supply … they become more valuable psychologically,” says Melissa Norberg, a professor of psychology at Macquarie University.

It’s a phenomenon called the “scarcity heuristic”, which is exploited to drive consumer behaviour. Dark patterns on e-commerce sites are one example: think “only one left” messaging that nudges us towards adding an item to an online shopping cart.

During the Covid pandemic, Victoria’s chief health officer, Dr Brett Sutton, advised people to consider stocking up with a fortnight’s worth of non-perishables, leading to temporary shortages of pantry items such as pasta.

In the case of fuel, the lack of supply is also driving up objective value in the form of petrol prices, “which then also makes it more psychologically [in demand],” Norberg says.

An inability to tolerate distress can be a driver of panic buying, Norberg adds. “If thinking that you might not have petrol puts you into distress, or you fear that it might not be there in the future and you don’t like to deal with uncertainty … that can drive people to stockpile.”

Panic buyers do not perceive themselves as selfish, a 2021 paper Norberg co-authored on the Covid-19 pandemic suggests. “[But] there’s a discrepancy between how people view themselves and how maybe others would view their behaviour, putting their desires before other people,” she says.

Dr Karina Rune, a researcher in health and behavioural sciences at University of the Sunshine Coast, says panic buying is primarily driven by perceived risk and social norms. In her research into behaviour during lockdowns, Rune described panic buying as “a short-lived coping response to situational stress and social contagion”.

Other research during the pandemic, looking at 54 countries, found that the announcement of lockdown restrictions triggered bursts of consumer panic that lasted between a week and 10 days.

Rune’s pandemic work did not find demographic factors such as socioeconomic status were drivers of panic buying, though other studies have suggested that household income and size may be determinants.

Her research identified three key drivers of stockpiling behaviour. The first was attitude – “if it feels like the smart thing to do, or a sensible thing to do” – and the second was perceived risk: the view that “if I don’t buy extra, I might run out and that will put myself and my family at risk,” she says.

The third factor was negative social norms, often reinforced by news reports. “The media was alight with pictures of people standing in queues, and trolleys full of toilet paper, and the message that was being sent is: this is what everyone else is doing, everyone is panic buying,” Rune says. “I think we see it a little bit today as well with … [reports highlighting] cars lining up and people fighting over petrol.”

Focusing on the minority of the population who are engaging in panic buying can inadvertently encourage stockpiling behaviour by reinforcing negative “descriptive norms”, according to Prof Liam Smith, director of BehaviourWorks Australia at Monash University.

Descriptive norms refer to our perceptions of what other people typically do in certain situations, and can be powerful drivers of behaviour. Research has shown that “if you find out your neighbours are saving more energy than you are, then you’re more likely to save [more] energy,” Smith says.

Politicians who exhort the public not to buy more than they need risk “emphasising the negative descriptive norm,” Smith says.

“What you’re saying is: most people are stockpiling. Appeals like that are not the best form of communication.”

What works to reduce panic buying?

“We want to reiterate that most people … are actually buying only what they need,” Rune says.

“We know that the shaming and the blaming, and phrasing it as selfish, or just saying ‘Don’t panic buy’ is not going to have any effect, because people are not getting reassured,” Rune says. “I think very much it’s about collective responsibility, reminding people … if we all buy more, it’s going to have an impact on more vulnerable populations.”

Norberg agrees, counselling people to think about vehicles in service industries – such as paramedics and fire trucks – that may have greater need for fuel.

“If you value generosity and equality and not being selfish, then try to uphold those values even when you’re feeling distress,” she says. “Don’t just act because you feel anxious.”

Norberg acknowledges that life may change significantly as a result of fuel shortages, in a similar manner to the pandemic.

“When Covid happened and there were restrictions … it wasn’t fun, but we all were doing it,” she says. “We learned ways to cope.”