This research synthesis may interest people – it evaluated 35 Safety-I & Safety-II papers relating to construction safety. A key focus was highlighting areas for integration. Not a summary – but paper is open access. I found some of the arguments a bit janky or underdeveloped, but appreciate the challenge the authors had; it also… Continue reading Building a safer future: Analysis of studies on safety I and safety II in the construction industry

This explored how safety accountability impacts safety performance of ‘safety managers’. Data was via survey of 269 Chinese safety managers (So note the demographics in interpreting the generalisability of the results, as always). For background: ·         There’s said to be a close connection between safety accountability and types of safety performance ·         They discuss different… Continue reading How safety accountability impacts the safety performance of safety managers: A moderated mediating model

I imagine this will interest just a smaller sub-set of people, but this study used FRAM to analyse the dust explosion at the Chinese Kunshan factory accident, which killed 146 people. They were able to examine the coupling and variability in key activities, and the initial and triggering parameters for the explosion. Note: There’s a… Continue reading FRAM-based causal analysis and barrier measures to mitigate dust explosions: A case study

This 2001 from Hollnagel & Amalberti discusses several arguments on how the concept of ‘human error’ (HE) exists only in the imagination of people. That is, rather than being an objectively observable phenomena, is more a “false impression” based in “the seductiveness that some concepts or ideas seem to have”. Parts 2 & 3 in… Continue reading The emperor’s new clothes: Or whatever happened to “human error”

An interesting paper from Andrew Hopkins in 1994 discussing the limits of LTIFRs. Likely nothing new for most people now – but it likely was in 1994. He explores two questions: ·         A general discussion on LTIFR and positive performance / process indicators ·         What can go wrong when LTIFRs are assumed to be a… Continue reading The limits of lost time injury frequency rates

An interesting Masters from J Allan Turner, who interviewed Safety-II experts. (Note it’s from 2017 – so there’s a lot of progress in application since then.) The following questions were explored: How do organizations implement Safety-II? How do organizations obtain buy-in from their leadership and employees? What tools and techniques are used in daily practice?… Continue reading How is Safety-II Being Applied in Practice and is it Working?

This study explored the role that occupational noise disturbance has on construction worker negative emotions and behaviour. (NB: Yeah – they use the term “unsafe behaviour”, but if you look beyond that and consider how noise can influence behaviour more broadly then the findings are pretty relevant.) Data came from 100 Indonesian construction workers and… Continue reading Noise disturbance increases negative emotions and unsafe behaviour among construction workers

This was cool. It studied the relationships between safety climate (SC), safety risk, engineering design work, deadlines & work intensification. Argued is although SC is often seen as an always positive attribute, in some cases positive SC may increase the potential for harm. Specifically they argue that since designers are often detached from the harmful… Continue reading Safety climate and increased risk: The role of deadlines in design work

An interesting theoretical and mathematical paper discussing the potentially “ineffectual … traditional risk assessment and risk matrix approach” for accounting for synergistic hazards (e.g. the interaction of hazards, reflecting the complexity of real-world situations). Not a summary – so check out the paper: ·         “Maharaj (2012) has described synergistic hazards as those involving the interaction… Continue reading Calculation of the number of synergistic hazards and risks on construction sites that limits the efficacy of risk assessment matrices

This banger from 2007 discusses some statistical limits of injury frequency rates, and ways to improve them via statistical means. Note: Cards on the table – I’m a big user of statistical methods like Poisson distributions, negative binomials, statistical control charts etc. for lots of stuff in safety (especially indicators), so this paper was right… Continue reading Revealing the Real Picture Behind Safety Performance Statistics