International Journal of Injury Control and Safety Promotion, 2015 Vol. 22, No. 1, 40–47, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/17457300.2013.844714
Risk compensation behaviours in construction workers’ activities Yingbin Fenga* and Peng Wub a
School of Computing, Engineering and Mathematics, University of Western Sydney, Locked Bag 1797, Penrith, NSW 2751, Australia; b School of Engineering and Technology, Central Queensland University, Rockhampton, QLD 4701, Australia (Received 25 July 2013; accepted 11 September 2013) The purpose of this study was to test whether the construction workers have the tendency of engaging in risk compensation behaviours, and identify the demographic variables, which may influence the extent to which the construction workers may show risk compensation behaviours. Both quantitative (survey) and qualitative (interviews) approaches were used in this study. A questionnaire survey was conducted with all the construction workers on three building construction sites of a leading construction company in Australia. Semi-structured interviews were then conducted to validate the findings of the quantitative research. The findings indicate that workers tend to show risk compensation behaviours in the construction environment. The workers with more working experience, higher education, or having never been injured at work before have a higher tendency to show risk compensation in their activities than the others. The implication is that contractors need to assess the potential influence of workers’ risk compensation behaviours when evaluating the effect of risk control measures. It is recommended that supervisors pay more attention to the behavioural changes of those workers who have more experience, higher education, and have never been injured before after the implementation of new safety control measures on construction site. Keywords: behaviour; construction; risk compensation; risk control; safety
1. Introduction Construction has been plagued with serious injuries and deaths for years. Unfortunate incidents have contributed to excessive loss of lives and damage to property, casting a pall over the construction industry. The situations of workplace safety in construction industry and the potential benefits of good Workplace Safety and Health performance, both humane and economic (Bird & Germain, 1996; Teo & Feng, 2011a, 2011b), had prompted the government, industries, and researchers to examine various strategies for enhancing construction site safety performance. Although technological advances have made the world safer and healthier, researchers have noted that some safety interventions, which had clear objective safety benefits, had failed to achieve the forecast savings in lives and injuries (e.g. Adams, 1982; Evans, 1986; Sagberg, Fosser, & Satermo, 1997). Adams (1982) examined the efficacy of seat-belt legislation through a comparative study of road-accident-fatality statistics from 18 countries and found that there was no correlation between the passing of seat-belt legislation and the total reductions in injuries or fatalities. Sagberg et al. (1997) investigated the drivers’ responses to airbags and antilock brakes and found that drivers of cars with airbags and antilock brakes tend to compensate by closer following, more lane *Corresponding author. Email: [email protected] Ó 2013 Taylor & Francis
changes, and a lower rate of seat-belt use, which accounted for the failure of airbags and antilock brakes to result in any measurable improvement in road safety. Shealy, Johnson, and Ettlinger (2008) who studied skiing and snowboarding injuries for more than 30 years found that the usage of ski helmets did not reduce fatalities and helmeted skiers tend to go faster. These studies have suggested that individuals will react to environmental changes in a compensatory fashion, so that riskier behaviours result from perceptions that the environment has become safer. Risk compensation theory states that individuals will behave less cautiously in situations where they feel ‘safer’ or more protected (Peltzman, 1975). Peltzman (1975) proposed such compensation mechanism to explain why some safety interventions had produced negligible results. According to Peltzman (1975), drivers simultaneously experience the competing demands of lower risks (i.e. lower probability of death from an accident) and what Peltzman calls ‘driving intensity’ (i.e. arriving at the destination more quickly, thrills, etc.). When safety devices are added, or the use of them is mandated, the risks associated with higher driving intensities are essentially lowered, e.g. drivers face a lower probability of death with the use of seat belt. Peltzman (1975) found that, under safer environment, drivers tend to increase speed rather than enjoy the increased safety
International Journal of Injury Control and Safety Promotion associated with driving at the same speed. Peltzman’s (1975) theory suggests that individuals tend to adjust their behaviours in response to perceived changes in risk (Stetzer & Hofmann, 1996). Although it has been well recognised that traffic or sports safety performance may be impacted by people’s risk compensation behaviours (e.g. Adams, 1982; Evans, 1986; Sagberg et al., 1997), it seems that no prior studies have been conducted to confirm whether the workers on construction sites have the tendency of engaging in risk compensation behaviours. It is also not known what factors may contribute to such behaviours. The individuals with some characteristics, which are still not known, may be more likely to engage in risk compensation behaviours than the others. Understanding the demographic factors that may influence the risk compensation behaviour may be important because identification of those construction workers most at risk for showing risk compensation will allow the contractors to focus prevention resources and target this high-risk group. This study aims to test whether the construction workers have the tendency of engaging in risk compensation behaviours and identify the demographic factors, which may influence the extent to which the construction workers may show risk compensation behaviours.
2. Methods 2.1. Research design The aims of this study indicate that this research is correlational and explanatory (Kumar, 2005) in nature. To achieve the research aims, both quantitative and qualitative approaches were applied to this study. The identification of demographic factors influencing the construction workers’ risk compensation behaviours and the test of whether the construction workers have the tendency of showing risk compensation are the quantitative aspects as they involve quantification of variables and statistical inferences, while the explanation of how does the demographic factors influence the risk compensation behaviours is the qualitative aspect of this research.
2.2. Data collection procedures The quantitative data were collected through the questionnaire survey and the qualitative data were collected through semi-structured interviews. The data collection was conducted on three sites (including two new residential apartment construction sites and an apartment block refurbishment site) of company A in the Sydney metropolitan area. Company A is one of Australia’s top 100 private companies with revenues in excess of AU$500 million per annum and more than 300 direct employees. It is a leading Australian construction company offering a complete
41
construction service for a wide range of projects in size from AU$1 to AU$100 million and covering the key industry sectors of retail, industrial, commercial, health, aged care, airports, education, and community projects. The data collection involved three stages. In the first stage, literature review, non-participant observations, and informal interviews were conducted to identify a list of potential risk compensation scenarios. In the second stage, a questionnaire was designed with the objective of testing whether the workers have the tendency of showing risk compensation behaviours under these scenarios and whether this tendency is affected by the workers’ demographic variables. The questionnaire survey was administered to all the front-line workers on the three construction sites. The final stage of data collection involved three semi-structured interviews. The interviewees comprise three site supervisors. The aim of the semistructured interviews was to validate the findings of the quantitative study. 2.3. Data collection instruments Fifteen potential risk compensation scenarios (see Table 1) were identified through onsite observations of unsafe behaviours as well as informal interviews. These observed risk compensation scenarios were then used to develop a survey questionnaire, which was used in the second stage of data collection. The questionnaire is composed of two sections. Section A was designed to collect the demographic information of the participants, e.g. gender, education level, experience, and whether or not they were injured in the past. A sample question in this section is: Have you been injured in the past while working on construction site? Section B lists 15 potential risk compensation scenarios, which were identified in the first stage. The respondents were requested to indicate their responses to the questions found in this section based on their experiences or perceptions on a 5-point Likert-type scale: 1 ¼ ‘much less likely’; 2 ¼ ‘somewhat less likely’; 3 ¼ ‘neither more nor less’; 4 ¼ ‘somewhat more likely’; and 5 ¼ ‘much more likely’. A sample question in this section is Scenario 1: If you were equipped with a fall protection harness, would you be more or less likely to move faster when working on the roofs with guardrails than what they normally would without a fall protection harness? Semi-structured interviews were used in the third stage of data collection. The interviews were semi-structured so that the researcher can ask in different ways for different participants. A semi-structured interview is
42
Y. Feng and P. Wu
Table 1. Potential risk compensation scenarios. Potential risk compensation scenarios Scenario 1 Scenario 2 Scenario 3 Scenario 4 Scenario 5 Scenario 6 Scenario 7 Scenario 8 Scenario 9 Scenario 10 Scenario 11 Scenario 12 Scenario 13 Scenario 14 Scenario 15
Workers move faster when working on the roofs with guardrails if they are equipped with a fall protection harness than what they normally would without a fall protection harness. Workers over-extend the body to expand the reaches when working on a perceived secured ladder. Workers walk up a ladder faster when they believe that it is secured. Workers wear muddy shoes or boots while climbing a ladder which is perceived as secured. Workers lean to the side when they are on a ladder which is perceived as secured. Workers walk on wet roofs or roofs in shadow which are damp when they perceive that the guardrails and fall arrest systems are in place. Workers carry as much as possible tiles to increase their productivity when they believe that it is within their best capacity and they are protected by gloves and safety boots. Workers do not check whether there are people underneath them when they perform cutting in the roof and know that there are safety warning signs in place. Workers do not check whether the nearby workers are wearing safety glasses when they are using a nail gun and they themselves are protected with safety glasses? Workers do not check whether the nearby workers are wearing respiratory mask and dust resistant safety eye wear when they are grinding or cutting roof tiles and they themselves are protected with respiratory mask and dust resistant safety eye wear. Whilst wearing steel cap safety boots and carrying a heavy object, workers take a rest and sit the heavy object on their steel cap boots as it is easier to pick up again. Whilst wearing steel capped safety boots and carrying a heavy object, workers allow their feet to land underneath the object whilst walking. Workers walk backwards on the roof without extra care when they know that they are protected with guardrails and fall arrest harness. Workers load tiles onto the elevator without frequently checking that the worker on the roof is keeping up with how quickly they are sending up the tiles as they know that their exposure to hazards is minimised by using a mechanical aid. Workers start working every day without doing warm-up exercises as they believe that their work environment is safe.
flexible, as it allows new questions to be brought up during the interviews as a result of what the interviewee says (Tan, 2004). This study’s interview is shown in Table 2. The table indicates the subjects and areas of focus for the semi-structured interviews. 2.4. Profile of respondents A total of 95 questionnaires were distributed on the three construction sites and 63 effective questionnaires were returned to the researcher, representing a response rate of 66%. The demographic characteristics of the respondents are reported in Table 3. There is only one female (1.6%) respondent in this survey, which may reflect the fact that construction roles are dominated by male in Australia. The years of experience in the construction industry range
from 1 to 27 years with an average of 11 years. Around half of the respondents have non-school qualifications (including certificate I–IV, advanced diploma and diploma, university degree, and above). The data also show that around half of the respondents have been involved in workplace injuries in the past. The profile of the respondents suggests that the data were collected from construction workers with a wide range of demographic characteristics except for the gender. The interviewees in the third stage of data collection comprised two roof-work supervisors and a painting supervisor from company A. All the three interviewees have more than 10 years of working experience on construction sites in Australia. This indicates that all the interviewees have adequate knowledge of workers’ safety activities in Australian construction context.
Table 2. Semi-structured interview questions. Section A B
Subject Workers’ risk compensation safety behaviours Safety implications of demographic factors
Area of focus Whether or not have the interviewees witnessed risk compensation behaviours on their site; causes and consequences of such behaviours; your actions. Gender; age or experience; education level; past experience of being injured.
International Journal of Injury Control and Safety Promotion Table 3. Profile of respondents. Profile
Number
Percentage
Gender Female Male
1 62
1.6 98.4
Years of experience
Risk compensation behaviours in construction workers’ activities Yingbin Fenga* and Peng Wub a
School of Computing, Engineering and Mathematics, University of Western Sydney, Locked Bag 1797, Penrith, NSW 2751, Australia; b School of Engineering and Technology, Central Queensland University, Rockhampton, QLD 4701, Australia (Received 25 July 2013; accepted 11 September 2013) The purpose of this study was to test whether the construction workers have the tendency of engaging in risk compensation behaviours, and identify the demographic variables, which may influence the extent to which the construction workers may show risk compensation behaviours. Both quantitative (survey) and qualitative (interviews) approaches were used in this study. A questionnaire survey was conducted with all the construction workers on three building construction sites of a leading construction company in Australia. Semi-structured interviews were then conducted to validate the findings of the quantitative research. The findings indicate that workers tend to show risk compensation behaviours in the construction environment. The workers with more working experience, higher education, or having never been injured at work before have a higher tendency to show risk compensation in their activities than the others. The implication is that contractors need to assess the potential influence of workers’ risk compensation behaviours when evaluating the effect of risk control measures. It is recommended that supervisors pay more attention to the behavioural changes of those workers who have more experience, higher education, and have never been injured before after the implementation of new safety control measures on construction site. Keywords: behaviour; construction; risk compensation; risk control; safety
1. Introduction Construction has been plagued with serious injuries and deaths for years. Unfortunate incidents have contributed to excessive loss of lives and damage to property, casting a pall over the construction industry. The situations of workplace safety in construction industry and the potential benefits of good Workplace Safety and Health performance, both humane and economic (Bird & Germain, 1996; Teo & Feng, 2011a, 2011b), had prompted the government, industries, and researchers to examine various strategies for enhancing construction site safety performance. Although technological advances have made the world safer and healthier, researchers have noted that some safety interventions, which had clear objective safety benefits, had failed to achieve the forecast savings in lives and injuries (e.g. Adams, 1982; Evans, 1986; Sagberg, Fosser, & Satermo, 1997). Adams (1982) examined the efficacy of seat-belt legislation through a comparative study of road-accident-fatality statistics from 18 countries and found that there was no correlation between the passing of seat-belt legislation and the total reductions in injuries or fatalities. Sagberg et al. (1997) investigated the drivers’ responses to airbags and antilock brakes and found that drivers of cars with airbags and antilock brakes tend to compensate by closer following, more lane *Corresponding author. Email: [email protected] Ó 2013 Taylor & Francis
changes, and a lower rate of seat-belt use, which accounted for the failure of airbags and antilock brakes to result in any measurable improvement in road safety. Shealy, Johnson, and Ettlinger (2008) who studied skiing and snowboarding injuries for more than 30 years found that the usage of ski helmets did not reduce fatalities and helmeted skiers tend to go faster. These studies have suggested that individuals will react to environmental changes in a compensatory fashion, so that riskier behaviours result from perceptions that the environment has become safer. Risk compensation theory states that individuals will behave less cautiously in situations where they feel ‘safer’ or more protected (Peltzman, 1975). Peltzman (1975) proposed such compensation mechanism to explain why some safety interventions had produced negligible results. According to Peltzman (1975), drivers simultaneously experience the competing demands of lower risks (i.e. lower probability of death from an accident) and what Peltzman calls ‘driving intensity’ (i.e. arriving at the destination more quickly, thrills, etc.). When safety devices are added, or the use of them is mandated, the risks associated with higher driving intensities are essentially lowered, e.g. drivers face a lower probability of death with the use of seat belt. Peltzman (1975) found that, under safer environment, drivers tend to increase speed rather than enjoy the increased safety
International Journal of Injury Control and Safety Promotion associated with driving at the same speed. Peltzman’s (1975) theory suggests that individuals tend to adjust their behaviours in response to perceived changes in risk (Stetzer & Hofmann, 1996). Although it has been well recognised that traffic or sports safety performance may be impacted by people’s risk compensation behaviours (e.g. Adams, 1982; Evans, 1986; Sagberg et al., 1997), it seems that no prior studies have been conducted to confirm whether the workers on construction sites have the tendency of engaging in risk compensation behaviours. It is also not known what factors may contribute to such behaviours. The individuals with some characteristics, which are still not known, may be more likely to engage in risk compensation behaviours than the others. Understanding the demographic factors that may influence the risk compensation behaviour may be important because identification of those construction workers most at risk for showing risk compensation will allow the contractors to focus prevention resources and target this high-risk group. This study aims to test whether the construction workers have the tendency of engaging in risk compensation behaviours and identify the demographic factors, which may influence the extent to which the construction workers may show risk compensation behaviours.
2. Methods 2.1. Research design The aims of this study indicate that this research is correlational and explanatory (Kumar, 2005) in nature. To achieve the research aims, both quantitative and qualitative approaches were applied to this study. The identification of demographic factors influencing the construction workers’ risk compensation behaviours and the test of whether the construction workers have the tendency of showing risk compensation are the quantitative aspects as they involve quantification of variables and statistical inferences, while the explanation of how does the demographic factors influence the risk compensation behaviours is the qualitative aspect of this research.
2.2. Data collection procedures The quantitative data were collected through the questionnaire survey and the qualitative data were collected through semi-structured interviews. The data collection was conducted on three sites (including two new residential apartment construction sites and an apartment block refurbishment site) of company A in the Sydney metropolitan area. Company A is one of Australia’s top 100 private companies with revenues in excess of AU$500 million per annum and more than 300 direct employees. It is a leading Australian construction company offering a complete
41
construction service for a wide range of projects in size from AU$1 to AU$100 million and covering the key industry sectors of retail, industrial, commercial, health, aged care, airports, education, and community projects. The data collection involved three stages. In the first stage, literature review, non-participant observations, and informal interviews were conducted to identify a list of potential risk compensation scenarios. In the second stage, a questionnaire was designed with the objective of testing whether the workers have the tendency of showing risk compensation behaviours under these scenarios and whether this tendency is affected by the workers’ demographic variables. The questionnaire survey was administered to all the front-line workers on the three construction sites. The final stage of data collection involved three semi-structured interviews. The interviewees comprise three site supervisors. The aim of the semistructured interviews was to validate the findings of the quantitative study. 2.3. Data collection instruments Fifteen potential risk compensation scenarios (see Table 1) were identified through onsite observations of unsafe behaviours as well as informal interviews. These observed risk compensation scenarios were then used to develop a survey questionnaire, which was used in the second stage of data collection. The questionnaire is composed of two sections. Section A was designed to collect the demographic information of the participants, e.g. gender, education level, experience, and whether or not they were injured in the past. A sample question in this section is: Have you been injured in the past while working on construction site? Section B lists 15 potential risk compensation scenarios, which were identified in the first stage. The respondents were requested to indicate their responses to the questions found in this section based on their experiences or perceptions on a 5-point Likert-type scale: 1 ¼ ‘much less likely’; 2 ¼ ‘somewhat less likely’; 3 ¼ ‘neither more nor less’; 4 ¼ ‘somewhat more likely’; and 5 ¼ ‘much more likely’. A sample question in this section is Scenario 1: If you were equipped with a fall protection harness, would you be more or less likely to move faster when working on the roofs with guardrails than what they normally would without a fall protection harness? Semi-structured interviews were used in the third stage of data collection. The interviews were semi-structured so that the researcher can ask in different ways for different participants. A semi-structured interview is
42
Y. Feng and P. Wu
Table 1. Potential risk compensation scenarios. Potential risk compensation scenarios Scenario 1 Scenario 2 Scenario 3 Scenario 4 Scenario 5 Scenario 6 Scenario 7 Scenario 8 Scenario 9 Scenario 10 Scenario 11 Scenario 12 Scenario 13 Scenario 14 Scenario 15
Workers move faster when working on the roofs with guardrails if they are equipped with a fall protection harness than what they normally would without a fall protection harness. Workers over-extend the body to expand the reaches when working on a perceived secured ladder. Workers walk up a ladder faster when they believe that it is secured. Workers wear muddy shoes or boots while climbing a ladder which is perceived as secured. Workers lean to the side when they are on a ladder which is perceived as secured. Workers walk on wet roofs or roofs in shadow which are damp when they perceive that the guardrails and fall arrest systems are in place. Workers carry as much as possible tiles to increase their productivity when they believe that it is within their best capacity and they are protected by gloves and safety boots. Workers do not check whether there are people underneath them when they perform cutting in the roof and know that there are safety warning signs in place. Workers do not check whether the nearby workers are wearing safety glasses when they are using a nail gun and they themselves are protected with safety glasses? Workers do not check whether the nearby workers are wearing respiratory mask and dust resistant safety eye wear when they are grinding or cutting roof tiles and they themselves are protected with respiratory mask and dust resistant safety eye wear. Whilst wearing steel cap safety boots and carrying a heavy object, workers take a rest and sit the heavy object on their steel cap boots as it is easier to pick up again. Whilst wearing steel capped safety boots and carrying a heavy object, workers allow their feet to land underneath the object whilst walking. Workers walk backwards on the roof without extra care when they know that they are protected with guardrails and fall arrest harness. Workers load tiles onto the elevator without frequently checking that the worker on the roof is keeping up with how quickly they are sending up the tiles as they know that their exposure to hazards is minimised by using a mechanical aid. Workers start working every day without doing warm-up exercises as they believe that their work environment is safe.
flexible, as it allows new questions to be brought up during the interviews as a result of what the interviewee says (Tan, 2004). This study’s interview is shown in Table 2. The table indicates the subjects and areas of focus for the semi-structured interviews. 2.4. Profile of respondents A total of 95 questionnaires were distributed on the three construction sites and 63 effective questionnaires were returned to the researcher, representing a response rate of 66%. The demographic characteristics of the respondents are reported in Table 3. There is only one female (1.6%) respondent in this survey, which may reflect the fact that construction roles are dominated by male in Australia. The years of experience in the construction industry range
from 1 to 27 years with an average of 11 years. Around half of the respondents have non-school qualifications (including certificate I–IV, advanced diploma and diploma, university degree, and above). The data also show that around half of the respondents have been involved in workplace injuries in the past. The profile of the respondents suggests that the data were collected from construction workers with a wide range of demographic characteristics except for the gender. The interviewees in the third stage of data collection comprised two roof-work supervisors and a painting supervisor from company A. All the three interviewees have more than 10 years of working experience on construction sites in Australia. This indicates that all the interviewees have adequate knowledge of workers’ safety activities in Australian construction context.
Table 2. Semi-structured interview questions. Section A B
Subject Workers’ risk compensation safety behaviours Safety implications of demographic factors
Area of focus Whether or not have the interviewees witnessed risk compensation behaviours on their site; causes and consequences of such behaviours; your actions. Gender; age or experience; education level; past experience of being injured.
International Journal of Injury Control and Safety Promotion Table 3. Profile of respondents. Profile
Number
Percentage
Gender Female Male
1 62
1.6 98.4
Years of experience
