PSYCHOLOGICAL APPROACH TO IMPLEMENT SAFETY

 NEED OF SAFETY PSYCHOLOGY

Safety is mostly concerned with control of accidents (control includes prevention). The accidents are due to unsafe conditions or unsafe actions or their combination. As per H.W. Heinrich’s theory, the majority (88%) of the accidents are due to unsafe actions of the workpeople. In modern plants, where the working conditions are good and well maintained, some accidents take place due to unsafe action i.e. human behavior of the workers. Therefore it is an important task to

study this unsafe action or human behaviour, to find out its causes, effects and remedial measures and to remove them. It is important to study first the human machine and its behaviour before studying any machine made by him. Psychology and psychologist do this task. This shows the need of psychological study in the field of safety also.

At present knowingly or unknowingly psychological principles are applied in accident control theories, but, well study of psychology or human mind brings perfection in them. All safety officers, engineers, supervisors, and inspectors should have good knowledge of psychology to understand and rectify the human behaviour, which is one of the causes of hazard occurrence and accidents. Need of applied psychology for safety in industry should be properly recognised. Psychological safety measures put stress on information, instruction, training and supervision for safe performance, which is also a statutory

need.

Human Resource (Psychology) Department of the industry should organize safety-training programmes for all types of workers.

INDUSTRIAL PSYCHOLOGY

Industrial psychology is concerned with the study of human behavior in those aspects of life that are related to the production, distribution, and use of the goods and services of our civilization. Application of the psychology to trade, business or industrial field is called industrial.

Ordway Teed says, “Every major management problem is in part psychological.”

Herbert Moore describes in his book six industrial problems for psychologists to solve:

1. Employing the worker.

2. Educating and training the worker.

3. Caring for the health and safety of the worker.

4. Helping to provide for the economic security of the worker.

5. Establishing workable employer-employee relationship and

6. Co-operating with the advertising and sales forces.

For proper selection of a right man for the right job, various tests are suggested such as service commission’s tests, intelligence tests, general ability tests, special ability tests  (mechanical and electrical), personality tests, aptitude and attitude tests, achievement tests etc. Various incentives are also suggested to motivate workers.

Main Subjects of Industrial Psychology:

Appraising and training the worker, accident-proneness, causes and prevention of accidents, employee fatigue and boredom, the problem employee, the psychological factors in labour turnover, consumer contracts and selling are the main subjects of industrial psychology.

SAFETY PSYCHOLOGY

Safety psychology is a part of industrial psychology and can be defined as follows:

Meaning and Aim:

Safety psychology is a study of human factors and behaviour contributing to the causation of hazard, accident or unsafe environment or situation and the application of remedial measures to prevent and control them by improving human behaviour for safe job performance and relations with others to maintain the safety.

Thus safety psychology studies a person why he commits accidents, under what circumstances and what are other contributing factors affecting his behaviour or making him accident prone and how such behaviour can be corrected to rectify his unsafe actions to achieve the goal of overall safety which includes the techniques of accident prevention.

The human being is at the center of such study and therefore it is called the human engineering. The concept of safety as human engineering is its psychological part. It aims at the rectification of human errors, human factors and unsafe actions as the causes of accidents or unsafe environment. H.W. Heinrich says in his old book on Industrial Accident Prevention that psychology lies at the root of a sequence of accident causes. For details see next chapter.

 Present Psychological Safety Problems:

Field of safety psychology is applicable to employer and employee both. Accidents are the results of faults of employer or employee. The main responsibility to provide and maintain

safe working conditions, safe environment, and protective equipment lies upon the employer, however, the practical field of effort for prevention through psychology and use of protective equipment is applied largely to the employees. The employees being more in number render more chances of human faults.

Therefore it is their great, individual and group or collective responsibility to minimise their human faults to prevent accidents and to maintain safety. Present psychological safety problems can be divided in two parts: Employer’s problems and Employee’s problems. Ultimately they create problems for society and nation also.

 Employer’s Problems:

Employers’ expectation or fear from the employees not only in the way of production targets but, in the form of attitudes, loyalties and co-operative efforts, is as important to the psychologist as the employers want to know about the resources, desires, motivation and capacities of their employees. Workers’ disobedience, indiscipline, sabotage, mischief, non-using of safety equipment or appliances or damaging them, not participating in safe close down of the plant for the purpose of safety and not even allowing others to carry out such safety duty and practicing strike or go slow to the extent of endangering safety of self, others and surrounding public are the present psychological problems creating worries for employers. They expect help from the Government which ought to be given, but, it must be noted that the only effective key to correct or improve human behaviour lies in the self-discipline or self-efforts and outsiders can contribute little if the wrongdoer is firmly determined not to improve himself. The Government may help in the field of law and order but it can hardly improve the human behaviour, which needs special efforts.

There are some statutory provisions in the Factories Act 1948 to punish workers for their offences regarding safety, but the Governments are reluctant to operate them against the workers. Even if they are operated, no worker will give evidence against a worker and another witness if come forward, they may be attacked by the mob mentality. Thus in the atmosphere of deliberate indiscipline or mischief in the field of safety, really, it is a challenging problem for psychologists to solve in the interest of safety.

Trade unions should also contribute to solving this problem.

The workers must understand that safety of them and others lie in their hands. Safety is a subject of construction and not destruction. If safety is not maintained, nobody will be happy and they themselves may lose their limbs or lives. Compensation cannot bring the life back. Safety of anybody’s life is of prime importance. No human behavior is morally or legally permitted to endanger or take away anybody’s life or to cause damage to plant, machinery, production or environment, as they all ultimately result in the national loss. Let us always maintain safety and solve our problems in the safe atmosphere only. Let us perform this safety-duty first, enjoy the right and let others also should enjoy their rights. This is the only good motivating force to mold the human

behaviour to maintain safety. Employers’ regular efforts to give such type of HRD training to their employees can be useful.

Apart from employer’s duty towards workers, new legislation during last ten years has imposed duty towards the public also.

Under the Factories Act, Environment (Protection) Act, Public Liability Insurance Act and Chemical Accidents (EPPR) Rules, the general public is to be informed about the hazards and their role in control measures and any citizen or member of a Crisis Group can demand such information from employers. This situation has created worries for the employers and they seem to be reluctant in providing such information to public. In case of a major accident affecting public, the Police and other authorities may prosecute them. A solution to this problem is the willing compliance of law only.

Employee’s Problems:

Employees’ expectation from the employer not only in the form of pay, but in the form of security, the opportunity for advancement and protection, is as important to the psychologist as what they want for themselves in the form of self-expression, recognition and acceptable working conditions and environment. It is the fact with many small and medium scale factories that workers’ expectation, as stated above, is rarely fulfilled. The exploitation of poor, uneducated, unorganized and mostly contract workers are still continued and they have to work long working hours under bad and unsafe working conditions and environment. Most of the educated workers do not get satisfactory wages and are de-motivated.

Trade unionism may change their attitudes. Even statutory requirements for health, safety and welfare are not provided for. They have no recognition, self-expression, protection, security or opportunity. They work only because of their livelihood, economic need or helplessness. The need and work of a Safety Officer are still not recognized wholeheartedly by the majority of the employers. This situation discourages and de-motivates the Safety Officers. Due importance must be given to all safety employees and their work. In spite of factory and safety legislation and inspectorate, the working conditions for workers are found generally not good. With few exceptions in some good factories, most of the places need improvement for a safe environment. The machines are not guarded, floor openings not covered, safe means of access not provided, safety devices neither provided nor working, occupational diseases go undetected and unreported, dusting, fuming, gassing and pollution constantly pollute the atmosphere, pressure vessels, lifting machines and other dangerous machines and processes are not fully safe and they cause many accidents. The same is the case with many chemical vessels, their fitting and maintenance. Workers also do not complain much, as they see such situations since long, as regular affairs, routine matters or have less hope for improvement.

Who is to blame for this? 

After all human beings are involved and they blame each other. Employers say they provided the safety arrangements but the workers do not maintain them. Some say they have no money to invest for costly safety equipment and the Government should give subsidy to them. Workers say opposite, that the safety devices are not provided or not working since long and nobody hears their complaints. Factory inspectors prosecute for many violations but mostly for other than safety. Only in case of accidents or special cases they prosecute for safety. Their finding is such that many employers do not provide or maintain safety devices for many reasons, and strict and repeated follow-up is not possible due to shortage of staff, time and manifold work. People blame the inspectors also. This is the real picture posing psychological problems at many fronts. The nature or extent of problems may vary with the place and person, but the general picture remains the same. Blaming each other will not solve the problem. All are right or wrong to some extent. It is doubtlessly, the primary duty of all employers to provide and maintain the safety requirements. There should be no defence for this. Safety expenditure must be planned from the beginning and should be provided every year. Safety committees should be formed with the inclusion of workers’ representatives to review safety conditions. The unsafe conditions and actions must be removed by joint efforts. The workers, supervisors and all work-people should strive for safety. Preventive and corrective maintenance should be carried out regularly. Such should be the attitudes. The Factory Inspectorate should be strict for safety compliance and should give all guidance for

safety knowledge. Trade unions should also contribute much including safety awareness and training. The human behaviour for safety must be motivated.

ACCIDENT CAUSATIVE FACTORS

Main Division of Factors affecting Work: Main factors affecting work performance or influencing actions of people are broadly

divided as

 (1) Environmental factors and

(2) Human factors.

The environmental factors are due to (1) Physical work and (2) Physical, chemical, biological and ergonomic environment. The

physical environmental factors are heat load due to heat, humidity, thermal radiation, air changes, velocity, ventilation, illumination, noise, vibration, etc. The chemical factors are corrosive, toxic, flammable, or explosive substances, dust, fumes, gas etc. The biological factors are bacteria, virus and micro-organisms. The ergonomic factors are layout and design of machinery, equipment, tools, controls, workplaces and housekeeping.

The human factors are due to two aspects

(1) Physiological and

(2) Psychological.

The physiological factors are the physiological fitness of an individual worker estimated from his maximum oxygen uptake capacity, Sex, Body build, Age, Muscular work, Posture, Clothing, Nutrition, Training, skill, and Occupational workload. The Psychological factors are Attitude, Aptitude, Frustration, Morale, Motivation, Individual differences etc. Industrial accidents are either due to unsafe conditions (situation or environmental factors) which include mechanical causes (unguarded machinery, defective equipment, dangerous situation etc.), chemical causes (toxic exposure, dust, fume, fire, explosion and variety of ill-effects due to hazardous nature of chemicals, their storage, processes and equipment), and physical causes (physical workload, working hours, heat, light, noise, vibration and working conditions) physiological causes (Age, sex, body-build, posture, physical fitness, health, physical fatigue, nervous strain, sickness etc.) or due to unsafe actions which include psychological causes (motivation, skill, training, carelessness, recklessness, habit, worry, emotional upsets, irresponsibility, poor attitudes etc.).

Generally, engineers, industrial hygienist and safety officer try to remove unsafe conditions and a physiologist and psychologist deal with unsafe actions. The details of physiological factors.The psychological factors being the main subject of this chapter are discussed below:

 GENERAL PSYCHOLOGICAL FACTORS

The psychological factors (a part of human factors) affecting human behaviour or influencing actions of people for work performance are many. The human attitudes and aptitudes, frustration and conflict, morale, individual differences, acclimatisation, skill and training, need and job satisfaction, motivation and aspiration, participation, incentives and job evaluation, fatigue, boredom and monotony, accident proneness, group dynamics, labour policy and turnover, personal selection and classification, problem worker etc. are the main psychological or personal factors affecting

human behaviour. Some psychological tests are also carried out to measure some of these factors.

H.W. Heinrich’s study of accident analysis emphasized that 88% of the accidents were due to unsafe act of the people,, and above factors were the main sub-causes or reasons for such unsafe acts, and therefore the study and application of remedial measures from this psychological point of view can prevent 88% of the accidents which is the great service of psychology to the industrial safety. No officer working for safety should ignore this fact. He should pay proper attention to correct the human behaviour of self and the workers due to these factors by giving constant training to them. These factors are explained below:

 Attitudes:

Norman Maier states that an attitude is a kind of mental set, posture or bent. It represents a predisposition toward opinions. Suppose a worker is asked what he thinks about a guard on his machine or temperature, or lighting in his workroom, his reply is nothing but his opinion. The attitude is more general and influences his opinion. Knowledge of attitudes of workers helps the management to predict their opinions. An attitude is a frame of reference, which affects our opinion of the objective fact. A change in attitudes may radically change opinions. Attitudes determine opinions and prejudices. Conservation and radicalism are two extreme kinds of attitudes. People with these differing attitudes have divergent opinions about the same facts. Disagreements about facts are also possible. Our various prejudices offer many illustrations of attitudes that determine the meanings, which facts may assume. Attitudes reconcile contradictions. With the proper attitude as a background, intelligent people can reconcile others’ contradiction. A clever and experienced Safety Officer or supervisor will reconcile contradictory opinions of workers and management about the efficacy of a particular safety device or a protective equipment, if he has knowledge of their attitudes. Such knowledge of attitudes helps him to find out the real cause of an accident. Our loyalties and our prejudices are

frequently in-group and out-group attitudes, respectively, and they provide sources of error in arriving at objectively sound conclusion. An attitude ‘we are right and others wrong’ has caused many accidents, and pose hindrances in solving problems. Attitudes are usually associated with likes and dislikes and consequently have an emotional content. Our moods are temporary predisposition toward having certain emotional reactions. Our moods influence our attitudes. 

In one mood, a supervisor will fly into a rage at a worker’s mistake, while in a different mood he may pass it off a something that could happen to anyone. Mood and attitude are difficult to differentiate. A mood is temporary and depends upon one’s physiological condition such as poor health, loss of sleep, hunger etc. Emotional upsets influence one’s physiological condition and produce moods, which predispose him to make unpleasant reactions. The reason and argument may or may not influence attitude. Generally, a man defends his opinion and shows no readiness to change it even though his all points are answered. People prefer their wishes and desires and are not ready to be convinced by logic. Personality differences determine the type of attitude. Some people are inclined toward radicalism, others toward conservatism, and still others avoid extremes. Likewise, differences in social dependability, decisiveness, emotionality, sex, intelligence and experience etc. influence attitudes on specific topics.

Various methods are used for measuring attitudes, and experimental findings are recorded. Industry cannot afford to make radical changes, which will backfire. Use of attitude scales (devised by Thurston), opinion polls, suggestion boxes, interview method, safety committee etc. are industrial practices to know employee attitudes, grievances, suggestions, personnel counselors etc. and thus to make it possible to prevent open violence or mass work stoppages.

Aptitudes:

Aptitude means inclination or fitness. Aptitudes are human characteristics or abilities related to the capacity to develop proficiency on specific jobs. These attitudes can be grouped into five classes:

1. Mental abilities.

2. Mechanical and related abilities.

3. Psychomotor abilities.

4. Visual skills and

5. Other specialized aptitudes.

Various aptitudes tests are used in personnel selection and placement. Mental ability means intelligence. The field of mental ability tests has been explored like other areas of testing. Some mental abilities are verbal comprehension, word fluency, memory, inductive reasoning, and number facility, spatial Visualization and speed of perception. Thurston’s studies suggest that primary mental ability can be measured by a test specifically designed for that ability. Mechanical ability includes certain mechanical aspects, such as mechanical

Comprehension and the understanding of mechanical principles and these are motors or physical skills such as muscular coordination and dexterity. Thurston has said it ‘a complex of intellectual abilities.’ Mechanical ability tests are used to select employees for jobs that require a mechanical ‘knack’ such as in the maintenance or setting up production machinery or in the repair of household appliances. Psychomotor tests are used to measure muscular abilities or combinations of sensory and muscular abilities. The term ‘psychomotor’ includes dexterity, manipulative ability, motor ability and eye-hand coordination and other aspects of muscular performance. Various psychomotor ability factors have been identified such as control precision, multi-limb coordination, response orientation, reaction time, speed of arm movement, rate control, manual dexterity, finger dexterity, arm-hand steadiness, wrist-finger speed, aiming etc.

Every industrial job requires some degree of vision and many jobs require a high degree of skill in some particular visual function. Colour discrimination is also an important factor.

Various vision tests are available. Specialised aptitudes or attributes include the tests of clerical aptitude, reading speed, comprehension, vocabulary, perceptual speed etc.

Frustration:

Frustration means to defeat or disappointment toward success. Any interference with the achievement of goal causes frustration. Characteristics of frustrated behaviour are suggestion, regression, fixation or resignation and it depends upon individual’s tolerance, work pressure, situation etc. If a worker meets with an accident on a power press machine, he becomes nervous to operate it and this may result in repeating the accident. By providing the effective guard and explaining him about its proper use, his frustration can be gradually removed. Frustration brings morale degradation, which in turn, increases accident rate.

A frustrated person responds in two ways:

(a) Adaptive response i.e. reduction of need is acceptable and attainable substitute goal.

(b) Maladaptive response i.e. the person may continue trying to reach the unattainable goal or he may give up trying to reach any goal whatsoever. Such maladaptive response may result in aggression as proposed by Dullard in 1939. But recent revisions in this theory suggest that frustration does not necessarily result in aggression but may result in withdrawal response, attack response, limitation response and substitution response.

As propounded by Scott (1966) in his activation theory, the human organism needs stimulation and variety in work. Environment without this motivation will suffer and frustration may result. Change or variety in job and stimulation may reduce frustration.

In industry, there are many instances creating frustration. Not providing proper working conditions, tools, equipment and PPE despite of demand, not providing necessary guards and safety devices on machines and not giving promotion, increment, recognition and status as per requirement can cause frustration. All such dissatisfying factors should be detected in time and appropriate remedial measures including management functions should be adopted. Some situations leading to frustration and techniques of identification and

management.

Conflict:

Conflict means a violent collision, a struggle or contest, a mental struggle etc. In industries conflicts of both the types - physical and mental - occur. Conflict reduces productivity. Conflict may arise due to attitude, jealousy, bad behavior, working condition/environment, power mongering, labour relation, favoritism etc. To reduce conflicts, provide all necessary and better tools, equipment, guards, safety devices, safety clothing, protective equipment and welfare facilities for the safe, healthy and satisfactory environment. Conflict may occur between employer and contract workers if the later is not considered at par with the company employees in respect of providing safety equipment, training and other facilities. Therefore facilities of safety, health, welfare and working hours should be equally given to them. Similarly, safety committee meeting should not become a platform for conflicts. Safety is not a matter of dispute or conflict.