Abstract
The construction industry has long accounted for one of the highest injury and fatality rates of any single-service industry. Within the construction industry, a promising technique is construction hazard prevention through design (CHPtD). Logically, CHPtD is only effective to the extent that construction hazards have emerged and are recognizable during the design phase.
The objectives of this study were to measure: (1) the extent that construction hazards are apparent or recognizable during design; (2) the hazard recognition skill of designers; and (3) the extent to which hazard recognition skill can be improved in design through training and mnemonics.
A multi-phase experiment was designed to identify 12 representative construction modules; observe the construction of these modules and conduct interviews to determine hazards present; obtain the design documents for the modules observed; and assess the ability of 17 designers to identify the hazards using only design documents.
The results of the experiment indicated that approximately 25% of all hazards are latent in design and, of those hazards that are patent, the average designer hazard recognition skill was 51%. Further, the hazard recognition skill of designers with construction field experience was, on average, 45% higher than designers with no construction field experience (p = 0.02). Finally, a brief introduction to the Haddon energy mnemonic increased designer’s hazard recognition skill by an average of 27% (p = 0.001).
Future research is suggested to determine the potential impact of emerging technologies on hazard recognition skill including three-dimensional printing and virtual design and construction software.
Ref: Hallowell, M.R., & Hansen, D. (2016). Measuring and improving designer hazard recognition skill: Critical competency to enable prevention through design. Safety Science, 82:254–263.
Abstract: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0925753515002349
****
From the full-text paper (pg. 262):
- Definitions: Latent hazards are those that have yet to emerge. Patent hazards are those that are reasonably recognisable.
- “this research showed that approximately 75% of hazards are patent in that they are reasonably identifiable during the design phase. The implication is that there is great potential for CHPtD, provided that designer hazard recognition skills are strong and that time and resources are devoted … Additionally, however, the finding suggests that there is a subset of construction hazards that are not reasonably identifiable during design, thus limiting CHPtD. It is important to recognize that not every hazard can be removed during design because some aspects of the work environment remain latent in construction projects, even for designers with significant construction experience”.
- “the overall designer skill scores were 51.1%, suggesting that designers have approximately equal hazard recognition skills to their construction worker counterparts. A key aspect of this finding is that, even under ideal conditions … designers are unable to recognize approximately half of the construction hazards implicit to and patent within their design”.
- Regarding the introduction of the Haddon energy mnemonic, “the … mnemonic delivered in approximately one hour is equivalent to real construction experience when it comes to improving raw hazard recognition skill. This is not to say that the mnemonic is in all ways equal to construction safety experience; however, the data do show that raw hazard recognition skill is improved greatly with the mnemonic, especially for designers who lack significant construction experience. Thus, the Haddon mnemonic should be considered by design practitioners as a cost-effective technique for hazard recognition improvement, especially when providing field experience is impractical”.
Authors: Hallowell, M.R., & Hansen, D. 2016. Safety Science, 82:254–263.
Study link: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssci.2015.09.005
Link to the LinkedIn article: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/measuring-improving-designer-hazard-recognition-skill-ben-hutchinson
SafetyInsights.org 