The oldest society on earth was first created some 200 million years ago.

A long, long time before the evolution of humankind, and long before even that of ants.

It originated with the appearance of the termites, the first social insects, which began to set a few basic ground rules for their behavior, organising themselves into different roles, each insect contributing something to the greater good.

These 'standard procedures' of evacuation are innate to termites

Termite society has since become, by almost every measure, extremely successful. More than 3000 termite species survive today, colonising most continents, living in societies that can number several million individuals.

Key to their survival is how termites get along with each other.

But just as important might be how these insects deal with conflict, and what happens when a termite society faces a crisis.

And that is something that scientists have just tested by causing crowds of termites to panic, to see how they react.

Entomologist Cai Wang and colleagues at Louisiana State University Agricultural Center in Baton Rouge, US selected one hundred worker and ten soldiers of the termite species Coptotermes formosanus. All the insects were originally caught from the wild.

They placed the termites in a series of Petri dishes, small plastic containers commonly used in laboratories. At this point, the insects randomly wandered around each dish.

The scientists then created a disturbance, by gently tapping each dish, panicking the insects. They repeated each trial 20 times, each time using new termites, they report in the journal Insect Science.

Individual ants tend not be either selfish, or impatient

When panicked the workers all gathered and ran in the same direction along the edge of each dish. But the soldiers ran in the opposite direction, or into the dish’s centre, snapping their jaws.

Both soldiers and workers emitted alarm calls, by thumping their abdomens against the floor.

The termites continued organising themselves in this way for a quarter of an hour.

These simple trials reveal something about the basic rules of termite society, say the researchers, and about how large groups of individuals can move together to avoid danger.

Studies on ants, for example, have revealed that individual ants tend not be either selfish, or impatient. But even ants can get it wrong; sometimes a whole group of ants may bolt for a single exit, when more than one is available, and individual ants can panic, blocking pathways or intersections, making it hard for others to escape.

Age-old response

Termites, having even older societies than ants, have a longer tradition of making group decisions, say the researchers. But until this study, no one had documented how well they respond in a crisis.

The termites follow the walls of the dishes when panicked, the researchers suggest, because the physical structure limits the random movements of individual insects, preventing collisions and keeping the group organised, and their escape efficient.

The soldiers meanwhile, head in the opposite direction, to counter the threat while the majority of termites affect their escape.

Such displays of collective ‘wisdom’ may explain the evolutionary success of termites.

It could also help humans understand how to also better respond in a crisis. In life-threatening situations, people tend to behave chaotically.

For example, when an earthquake measuring 8.0 on the Richter scale hit Sichuan, China, in 2008, all 2300 students and teachers in a high school successfully evacuated from buildings in fewer than 100 seconds, report the scientists.

The students escaped by following one another in lines, with teachers directing them and regulating their running speed.

“These 'standard procedures' of evacuation are innate to termites”, write the scientists in their research paper.