Search results

1 – 10 of over 4000
Article
Publication date: 15 July 2022

Guodong Ni, Qi Zhang, Yaqi Fang, Ziyao Zhang, Yaning Qiao, Wenshun Wang and Yongliang Deng

The purpose of this paper is to explore the correction mechanism of resilient safety culture on new generation of construction workers (NGCWs)' unsafe behavior and test the…

1073

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to explore the correction mechanism of resilient safety culture on new generation of construction workers (NGCWs)' unsafe behavior and test the multiple mediation effects of job crafting and perceived work meaningfulness based on the context of Chinese construction industry in order to find a new way to effectively correct the NGCWs' unsafe behavior.

Design/methodology/approach

A theoretical model of correction mechanism was established based on literature research and theoretical deduction. An empirical study was employed based on confirmatory factor analysis and regression analysis with a sample of 404 NGCWs in China.

Findings

The results indicated that resilient safety culture can effectively correct NGCWs' unsafe behavior through job crafting and perceived work meaningfulness. Job crafting and perceived work meaningfulness can play independent and serial mediating roles between resilient safety culture and unsafe behavior.

Research limitations/implications

Research results only represent a short-term law about the correction mechanism of NGCWs' unsafe behavior based on a questionnaire study from China's construction industry. It is necessary to continue to implement a longitudinal study to test it in a relatively long period in future research. The findings also need to be verified based on the young construction workers in other countries.

Practical implications

This study provides a theoretical basis and feasible management reference for construction enterprises in China to correct NGCWs' unsafe behavior from the perspective of resilient safety culture. Furthermore, the construction of resilient safety culture in construction enterprises can help NGCWs better carry out job crafting and perceive the meaning of work.

Originality/value

This paper clarifies the correction mechanism of resilient safety culture on unsafe behavior of NGCWs, and further tests the independent mediating roles and a serial mediating role of job crafting and perceived work meaningfulness between resilient safety culture and unsafe behavior, which fills the research gap about the influence mechanism of resilient safety culture on young construction workers' unsafe behavior and enriches the theoretical system of unsafe behavior correction of construction workers.

Details

Engineering, Construction and Architectural Management, vol. 30 no. 10
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0969-9988

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 8 July 2020

Emmanuel Adinyira, Patrick Manu, Kofi Agyekum, Abdul-Majeed Mahamadu and Paul Olaniyi Olomolaiye

Work on construction sites involves individuals with diverse character, temperament,age, physical strength, culture, religion and experience level. A good number of these…

Abstract

Purpose

Work on construction sites involves individuals with diverse character, temperament,age, physical strength, culture, religion and experience level. A good number of these individuals are also alleged to involve themselves in substance and alcohol abuse due to the physically demanding nature of their work. These could promote the prevalence of violence on construction sites which could in turn affect safety on construction sites. However, there is a lack of empirical insight into the effect of violent behaviour and unsafe behaviour on construction sites. This study therefore pioneers an empirical inquiry into the relationship between violent behaviour and unsafe behaviour on construction sites.

Design/methodology/approach

Seventeen violent behaviours and 15 unsafe behaviours were measured on 12 construction sites among 305 respondents using a structured questionnaire. A total of 207 valid questionnaire responses were collected from site workers. Partial least square–structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) technique was used to examine the relationship between violent behaviour and unsafe behaviour.

Findings

The results indicate that there is a significant positive relationship between violent behaviour and unsafe behaviour on construction sites.

Originality/value

The findings from this study provide valuable insight into a less investigated dimension of the problem of construction site safety management. A focus on attitudinal issues such as how workers relate toward others and toward self should be an important consideration in safety improvement interventions on construction sites.

Details

Engineering, Construction and Architectural Management, vol. 27 no. 10
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0969-9988

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 30 April 2021

Shengyu Guo, Yujia Zhao, Yuqiu Luoren, Kongzheng Liang and Bing Tang

Knowledge discovery related to unsafe behaviors promotes the performance of accident prevention in construction. Although numerous studies on accident causation models have…

Abstract

Purpose

Knowledge discovery related to unsafe behaviors promotes the performance of accident prevention in construction. Although numerous studies on accident causation models have discussed the correlations of unsafe behaviors with various factors (e.g., unsafe conditions), limited research explores correlations between unsafe behaviors within accidents. The purpose of this paper is mining strong association rules of unsafe behaviors from historical accidents to clarify this kind of tacit knowledge.

Design/methodology/approach

A case study was adopted as the research approach, in which accident records from building and urban railway construction in China were selected as data resources. The groups of unsafe behaviors extracted from accident records were expressed by the definitions of unsafe behaviors from safety regulations and operating procedures. Frequent Pattern (FP)-Growth algorithm was used for association rule mining, and the critical correlations between unsafe behaviors were represented by the effective strong rules.

Findings

The findings identify and distinguish correlations between unsafe behaviors within construction accidents. In building construction, workers and managers should pay attention to preventing unsafe behaviors related to personal protective equipment and machines and equipment. In urban railway construction, workers should especially avoid unsafe behaviors of inadequately dealing with environmental factors.

Practical implications

Tacit knowledge is transferred to explicit knowledge as the critical correlations between unsafe behaviors within accidents are determined by the effective strong rules. Additionally, the findings provide practice guidance for safety management, to collaboratively control unsafe behaviors with strong correlations.

Originality/value

This study contributes to the body of safety knowledge in construction and provides a further understanding of how construction accidents are caused by multiple unsafe behaviors.

Details

Engineering, Construction and Architectural Management, vol. 29 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0969-9988

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 21 April 2022

Shuwen Deng, Yili Cai, Longpan Xie and Yonggang Pan

Unsafe behavior is a major cause of safety accidents, while in most management measures for unsafe behavior, the construction workers are generally managed as a whole. Therefore…

Abstract

Purpose

Unsafe behavior is a major cause of safety accidents, while in most management measures for unsafe behavior, the construction workers are generally managed as a whole. Therefore, this study aims to propose group management of construction workers' unsafe behavior considering individual characteristics.

Design/methodology/approach

A cognitive process model with ten cognitive factors was constructed based on cognitive safety theory. The questionnaire was developed and validated based on the cognitive model, and the results showed that the questionnaire had good reliability and validity, and the cognitive model fitted well. Latent class analysis was used to classify the unsafe behaviors of construction workers.

Findings

Four categories of cognitive excellent type, cognitive failure type, no fear type and knowingly offending type were obtained. Workers of cognitive excellent type have good cognitive ability and a small tendency for unsafe behaviors. Workers of cognitive failure type have poor cognitive ability and the potential for cognitive failure in all four cognitive links. Workers of no fear type have weak cognitive ability, and cognitive failure may occur in discovering information and choosing coping links. Workers of knowingly offending type have certain cognitive abilities, but cognitive failure may occur in choosing coping link.

Originality/value

This study formulates targeted management measures according to the potential characteristics of these four types and provides scientific theoretical support for the personalized management of unsafe behavior.

Details

Engineering, Construction and Architectural Management, vol. 30 no. 7
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0969-9988

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 25 April 2022

Tung-Ju Wu, Jia-Min Li and Yenchun Jim Wu

This study aimed to explore the relationship between job insecurity and unsafe behaviour in human–machine collaboration, as well as investigating the mediating roles of emotional…

1171

Abstract

Purpose

This study aimed to explore the relationship between job insecurity and unsafe behaviour in human–machine collaboration, as well as investigating the mediating roles of emotional exhaustion and moderating roles of psychological detachment.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors followed the stressor-detachment model to build our research model. The authors selected manufacturing and service industry employees as samples, and designed three independent studies using the time-lagged method for SPSS and AMOS to test the hypotheses.

Findings

The results indicated that emotional exhaustion mediated the relationship between the two types of job insecurity and unsafe behaviours among service industry employees, while psychological detachment moderated the effect of qualitative job insecurity on emotional exhaustion. In manufacturing, psychological detachment moderated the effect of quantitative job insecurity on emotional exhaustion, while emotional exhaustion mediated the relationship between quantitative job insecurity and unsafe behaviours.

Research limitations/implications

The authors enhance understandings of how individual employee characteristics and the work environment jointly influence employees' levels of emotional exhaustion and likelihood of engaging in unsafe behaviours under the stressor-detachment model.

Practical implications

The authors suggest an important role of psychological detachment in human–machine collaboration. The authors also that organisations and managers could encourage employees not to check work-related emails on weekends to achieve full detachment.

Originality/value

This study contributes to both the stressor-detachment model and job insecurity literature. In addition, it investigates the role of detachment and emotional exhaustion by employees in human–machine collaboration.

Article
Publication date: 1 December 2021

Pinsheng Duan and Jianliang Zhou

The construction industry is an industry with a high incidence of safety accidents, and the interactions of unsafe behaviors of construction workers are the main cause of…

Abstract

Purpose

The construction industry is an industry with a high incidence of safety accidents, and the interactions of unsafe behaviors of construction workers are the main cause of accidents. The neglect of the interactions may lead to serious underestimation of safety risks. This research aims to analyze the cascading vulnerability of unsafe behaviors of construction workers from the perspective of network modeling.

Design/methodology/approach

An unsafe behavior network of construction workers and a cascading vulnerability analysis model were established based on 296 actual accident cases. The cascading vulnerability of each unsafe behavior was analyzed based on the degree attack strategy.

Findings

Complex network with 85 unsafe behavior nodes is established based on the collected accidents in total. The results showed that storing in improper location, does not wear a safety helmet, working with illness and working after drinking are unsafe behaviors with high cascading vulnerability. Coupling analysis revealed that differentiated management strategies of unsafe behaviors should be applied. Besides, more focus should be put on high cascading vulnerability behaviors.

Originality/value

This research proposed a method to construct the cascading failure model of unsafe behavior for individual construction workers. The key parameters of the cascading failure model of unsafe behaviors of construction workers were determined, which could provide a reference for the research of cascading failure of unsafe behaviors. Additionally, a dynamic vulnerability research framework based on complex network theory was proposed to analyze the cascading vulnerability of unsafe behaviors. The research synthesized the results of dynamic and static analysis and found the key control nodes to systematically control unsafe construction behaviors.

Details

Engineering, Construction and Architectural Management, vol. 30 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0969-9988

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 2 December 2021

Sheng Xu, Mengge Zhang, Bo Xia and Jiangbo Liu

This study aimed to identify driving factors of safety attitudinal ambivalence (AA) and explore their influence. Construction workers' intention to act safely can be instable…

Abstract

Purpose

This study aimed to identify driving factors of safety attitudinal ambivalence (AA) and explore their influence. Construction workers' intention to act safely can be instable under conflicting information from safety management, co-workers and habitual unsafe behaviour. Existing research explained the mechanism of unsafe behaviours as individual decisions but failed to include AA, as the co-existence of both positive and negative attitude.

Design/methodology/approach

This study applied system dynamics to explore factors of construction workers' AA and simulate the process of mitigating the ambivalence for less safety behaviour. Specifically, the group model building approach with eight experts was used to map the causal loop diagram and field questionnaire of 209 construction workers were used to collect empirical data for initiating parameters.

Findings

The group model building identified five direct factors of AA, namely the organisational safety support, important others' safety attitude, emotional arousal, safety production experience and work pressure, with seven feedback paths. The questionnaire survey obtained the initial values of the factors in the SD model, with the average ambivalence at 0.389. The ambivalence between cognitive and affective safety attitude was the highest. Model simulation results indicated that safety experience and work pressure had the most significant effects, and safety experience and positive attitude of co-workers could compensate the pressure from tight schedule and budget.

Originality/value

This study provided a new perspective of the dynamic safety attitude under the co-existence of positive and negative attitude, identified its driving factors and their influencing paths. The group model building approach and field questionnaire surveys were used to provide convincible suggestions for empirical safety management with least and most effective approaches and possible interventions to prevent unsafe behaviour with tight schedule and budget.

Details

Engineering, Construction and Architectural Management, vol. 30 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0969-9988

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 5 January 2022

Mehdi Mohajeri, Abdollah Ardeshir and Hassan Malekitabar

This study aims to show what interventions in human factors can effectively reduce construction workers' unsafe behavior.

Abstract

Purpose

This study aims to show what interventions in human factors can effectively reduce construction workers' unsafe behavior.

Design/methodology/approach

A diagnostic intervention model targeted the construction workers' weakest internal factors. The workers' behavior and cognition data were collected via a questionnaire and a video camera system from two medium-sized construction sites. A safety supervisor accompanied each site supervisor to improve construction workers' internal factors by implementing the designed intervention measures.

Findings

The statistical analysis results confirmed a persistent positive effect on construction workers' safe behavior by improving internal factors. Among the intervention programs applied, those aimed to improve the subjective norms, safety knowledge and attitudes had the most significant effect sizes.

Practical implications

The findings of this case study advise project managers to design a specific behavioral intervention that aims at improving construction workers' significant internal factors, including subjective norms, safety attitudes, habits and knowledge together with demographic characteristics to reduce construction workers' unsafe behavior.

Originality/value

While the declining rate of construction accidents approaches an asymptote which is still high, this study suggests that targeting the individual internal factors through diagnostic interventions is the key to further reduce the rate by improving construction workers' behavior.

Details

Engineering, Construction and Architectural Management, vol. 30 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0969-9988

Keywords

Open Access
Book part
Publication date: 1 May 2019

Radhlinah Aulin, Åsa Ek and Christofer Edling

This paper will examine the unsafe work practices that are plaguing the construction industry. Statistics show that four out of five of all workplace accidents are attributed to…

Abstract

Purpose

This paper will examine the unsafe work practices that are plaguing the construction industry. Statistics show that four out of five of all workplace accidents are attributed to unsafe behaviour. Research studies have sought to understand worker self-protection. For example, it is difficult to make predictions of conditions that influenced worker’s behaviour to act unsafely or safely in a given work situation. It is evident there is a gap in the literature in this area of research, most notably failing to understand the underlying “why” factors. The aim of the study is to identify and examine the proximate set of contributing factors most likely to have an influence on workers’ decisions about participation in unsafe behaviour.

Design/Methodology/Approach

To perform the study, questionnaires were adopted, and 225 construction workers from 9 construction companies participated in the study.

Findings

Results showed that both underlying organisational factors and individual factors could affect the risk aversion among construction workers. The paper also highlights measures to create a safe work environment to minimise unsafe behaviour among construction workers. Results from the study are important to help organisation to systematically plan for a good working environment.

Research limitations

As the results were based only from the questionnaires, a deeper understanding behind the workers’ responses was not probed.

Practical implications

Construction companies should work at several organisational levels at the same time. It is necessary to include levels such as individual, group, workplace and management levels, thus taking a system perspective on risk behaviour and safety.

Details

10th Nordic Conference on Construction Economics and Organization
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-83867-051-1

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 1 August 1994

Jorma Saari

The reinforcement of safe behaviour by positive feedback, in other wordsbehaviour modification (B. Mod.), is one of the most successful safetyinnovations achieved during the past…

2155

Abstract

The reinforcement of safe behaviour by positive feedback, in other words behaviour modification (B. Mod.), is one of the most successful safety innovations achieved during the past 20 years. A literature review of 24 empirical studies noted that every study had produced a change in work behaviour. According to the authors: “Few literature reviews find such consistent results”. The effect on accidents is explained by stating that unsafe acts are modified through feedback to safe acts. The studies demonstrate that the effect on injuries is sometimes much greater than could be expected from the behavioural change. This might be because the target behaviours to be modified are properly chosen to represent critical behaviours that everyone involved wanted to change. A positive change encourages people to try to solve other problems as well, and this gradually leads to overall improvements. A B.Mod. programme can act as an initiator of a cultural change leading to sustainable effects within the organization.

Details

Leadership & Organization Development Journal, vol. 15 no. 5
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0143-7739

Keywords

1 – 10 of over 4000