Occupational-level interactions between physical hazards and cognitive ability and skill requirements in predicting injury incidence rates.

Abstract

Interactions between occupational-level physical hazards and cognitive ability and skill requirements were examined as predictors of injury incidence rates as reported by the U. S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Based on ratings provided in the Occupational Information Network (O*NET) database, results across 563 occupations indicate that physical hazards at the occupational level were strongly related to injury incidence rates. Also, as expected, the physical hazard-injury rate relationship was stronger among occupations with high cognitive ability and skill requirements. In addition, there was an unexpected main effect such that occupations with high cognitive ability and skill requirements had lower injury rates even after controlling for physical hazards. The main effect of cognitive ability and skill requirements, combined with the interaction with physical hazards, resulted in unexpectedly high injury rates for low-ability and low-skill occupations with low physical hazard levels. Substantive and methodological explanations for these interactions and their theoretical and practical implications are offered. Results suggest that organizations and occupational health and safety researchers and practitioners should consider the occupational level of analysis and interactions between physical hazards and cognitive requirements in future research and practice when attempting to understand and prevent injuries.

The Influences of Recruitment Processes and Selection Predictors on New Employee Safety

“…Ramsey's model provides a solid foundation for an employee selection program to include measures of the human abilities required to ensure an employee's safe performance of their job. This conclusion is supported by the study conducted by Ford and Wiggins (2012) where cognitive ability and skill mediated the relationship between physical hazard and injury/incident rate. Furthermore, it highlights the importance of communicating information on the abilities required to perform a job safely during the recruitment phase.…”

“…It is well established that general cognitive ability is a valid and reliable predictor of overall job performance, job-knowledge acquisition, and training performance (Schmidt and Hunter 1998). Furthermore, evidence of positive relationships between cognitive ability and safety behavior (or the ability to work safely) is mounting (e.g., Ford and Wiggins 2012;Postlethwaite et al 2009). While the measurement of general mental ability is undoubtedly useful for the prediction of employee behavior, a more fine-grained analysis of cognitive abilities is possible.…”

“…Furthermore, job analysis allows the safety risks associated with a job to be determined, and also the identification of the knowledge, skills, and abilities required to work, both safely, and at a satisfactory performance level. It is well established that the occupation or job a person is performing substantially influences accident vulnerability (Ford and Wiggins 2012). In other words, it is vital for safety, for the specific hazards and risks associated with a job to be identified, and conducting a job analysis is an approach which can be used to collect this information.…”

The Influence of Individual and Team Cognitive Ability on Operators’ Task and Safety Performance: A Multilevel Field Study in Nuclear Power Plants

“…While these aspects of performance have been mostly researched in the framework of motivation, social influence and stress [10], they may also be influenced by GMA for two reasons. First, according to the job-demand-control model [11], when operators have equal job-demands, high GMA ones are more likely to take control of their work than their low GMA counterparts and therefore have better safety performance [12], [13]. Second, from a learning perspective, GMA and work experience can interact to influence one’s job-related knowledge, which can in turn promote both task and safety performance [9], [14].…”

“…Nevertheless, evidence shows that high GMA is related to a reduced involvement in accidents and more organizational participatory behaviors [29]–[31]. These findings can be explained in a job-demand-control framework [11]: as GMA is one of the most important abilities required by MCR operators [12], those with a high level of GMA are more likely to take control of their work given job-demand being equal, which can in turn increase their safety performance [13]. As a result, we postulate Hypothesis 1:…”