Safety psychology adds what?

I gave a brief presentation, about an hour, to some insurance company representatives in Nottingham a couple of years ago on my usual subject of psychology in safety. It went down well and at the end I was asked “How much do you think this approach can reduce accidents in the workplace?”

There was some disappointment in the room. I think the questioner and others had expected the usual answer from a workplace psychologist of 60% (I have seen claims that are even higher than that) whereas my actual answer was 1% to 2%. I don’t think that was what people expected to hear or wanted to hear.

The reason I quote such a relatively low figure is that the bulk of accidents are prevented by what you might call normal health and safety practices. That is to say, guarding machinery properly to current standards, substituting safer methods or substances and so on.

The fact of the matter is that safety psychology really comes into its own when you want to understand what type of instructions, supervision and awareness training are required. I think the classic example of that is when employees are asked to join in with risk assessments on their task (a good practice). There are usually two problems with that. The first is that such employees are not always trained in risk assessment so their contribution is often somewhat faltering. Secondly we have a tendency to take on more risk for themselves than we do for other people and that is what we get if we simply ask the employee what they think the hazards are on their task. They will take on the risk gladly and not give much detail (I am generalising).

However, if you were to ask them what hazards would be present for a small child were to do the task you will get more of a response. We tend to take more care for other people, especially children, so the answer will be broader.

It is that sort of small input that provides a little more information hence my answer of 1% to 2%. There are many other aspects to this subject off course and this is only a short article. Good management practices and good safety practices will do the bulk of the work. It is the extra 1% or 2% that some businesses want that is achievable.

In cases where the business has serious risks (are there really any businesses with low risks?) that 1 or 2 % could be important.

I’ll be writing more next week. The next article will look more at what our senses tell us versus reality, the two things are often different.