Moral disengagement (MD) is the process by which individuals mitigate the consequences of their own violations of moral standards. Although MD is understood to be co-determined by culture norms, no study has yet explored the extent to which MD applied to safety at work (JS-MD) fosters safety violations (e.g., accident underreporting), nor the role of organizational culture as a predictor of JS-MD. The current study seeks to address this gap in the literature by examining individual- (MD) and organizational-level (culture) factors that explain why employees fail to report workplace accidents. We tested a latent variable structural model positing organizational culture typologies (autocratic, bureaucratic, clan-patronage, technocratic, and cooperative) as predictors of JS-MD, which in turn is expected to mediate the relationship with accident underreporting. Using data from 1033 employees in 28 Italian organizations, findings suggest that bureaucratic safety culture was related to lower levels of JS-MD, whereas technocratic safety culture was related to greater JS-MD. In turn, JS-MD positively predicted employee accident underreporting and fully mediated the relationship between culture and underreporting. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed in light of the increasing focus on underreporting as well as the adverse individual and organizational consequences of failing to report workplace accidents.
Ref: Petitta, L., Probst, T.M., & Barbaranelli, C. (2015). Safety Culture, Moral Disengagement, and Accident Underreporting. Journal of Business Ethics, May 2015.
**
From the full-text paper:
- Definitions of the cultural typologies:
- Autocratic: communication mainly flows downwards through one’s own direct manager and the manager provides instructions and directions for employees.
- Bureaucratic: the fundamental value is adherence to organisational safety norms and rules, set by top level stakeholders (leaders, government etc). Individuals are expected to respect roles & boundaries and perform tasks without deviation
- Clan-patronage: Here there’s a clear distinction between in-group and out-group team memberships with in-group members being privy to informal but potent bases of power. In-group stakeholders act differently around outsiders. These group memberships lead to different safety rules and directions depending on what “inner circle” they belong to.
- Technocratic: This typology is characteristic of result-oriented and focused on competition and innovation. However, the focus on achievement and innovation may also result in performance variability and changes in rule following.
- Cooperative: Here value is given to the achievement of consensus and the participation of all members in decision making.
- Noted is that while “popular press” tends to focus on instances of individuals faking workplace injuries for compensation, the reality is that workplace underreporting is far more prevalent with previous research suggesting that up to 71 to 80% of workplace incidents go unreported. Factors associated with lack of reporting included: fear of reprisals or loss of benefits; people thought that nothing would be done to fix the problem; it wasn’t thought to be important enough to report; people didn’t want to be the one to break the company’s safety record or affect their work-group’s safety performance; perceived production pressure, and; perceived job insecurity. (pp. 2, 4);
- Regarding excessive production pressure from the organisation, the authors propose that this could lead to a diffusion of safety responsibility from workers and cite the following example: ‘‘If my company cares more about production than about my safety, why should I care about accurate reporting?” (pg. 4);
- Key findings are that: “bureaucratic safety culture discourages employees to morally disengage from safety violations, whereas a technocratic safety culture is predictive of higher employee MD. Therefore, management and employees should be made aware of the specific influence that their organizational culture may have on the development of MD mechanisms and subsequent underreporting. Our findings suggest that enhancing bureaucratic features related to safety enforcement and de-emphasizing technocratic features related to production pressure at the expense of safety may help decrease the activation of safety-related MD and subsequent underreporting behaviors” (pg. 12);
- MD was found to fully mediate the relationship between safety culture and accident underreporting, indicating that “safety culture does not have a direct effect on accident reporting behaviors, but rather has its influence via the role that culture plays in shaping safety-related moral disengagement” (p11)
- Whereas existing research has focused on things like culture and climate, or knowledge of motivation related to reporting, MD has not received similar study in this context. They note that “While safety culture and climate can certainly shape knowledge and motivation, our research indicates that culture is also related to the propensity for individual employees to morally disengage from their organizational duty to accurately report workplace accidents” (p11);
- “While modifying existing culture patterns is challenging, research suggests interventions should focus on changing programs that crystallize the organization’s beliefs and behaviors (DeJoy 2005). Furthermore, given the deeply rooted nature of shared organizational culture beliefs (Schein, 1985), intervention effectiveness assessment should evaluate the extent to which the safety culture may be affected at multiple levels within the organization, i.e., employees, supervisors/middle management, and top management” (pg. 12).
Authors: Petitta, L., Probst, T.M., & Barbaranelli, C. (2015). Safety Culture, Moral Disengagement, and Accident Underreporting. Journal of Business Ethics, May 2015.
Study link: https://psycnet.apa.org/doi/10.1007/s10551-015-2694-1
Link to the LinkedIn article: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/safety-culture-moral-disengagement-accident-ben-hutchinson
SafetyInsights.org 