Structural Model of Internal Factors Influencing the Safety Behavior of Construction Workers

The frequent occurrence of safety accidents is a global problem, and unsafe behavior is the main cause of accidents, which has been unanimously recognized by academia and industry. However, the previous research on unsafe behavior focused on analyzing the linear effects of variables on the results, and it was difficult to systematically analyze the complex mechanism of the results generated by the coupling of each variable. The problem of how to avoid unsafe behavior of construction workers has not been effectively solved. Based on the configuration perspective, on-site observation is organized, 164 construction workers are taken as case samples, the traditional regression analysis method is abandoned, and the fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis method is used to integrate the theoretical framework of social cognition. From the perspective of psychological cognition and institutional environment, this paper discusses the differential matching of construction workers’ safety attitude, safety motivation, institutional control, safety training, and safety climate, and exploring the causal complex mechanisms that improve unsafe behavior among construction workers. The results show that: (1) The unsafe behavior of construction workers is the result of multiple factors. A single influencing factor does not constitute a necessary condition for the unsafe behavior of construction workers; (2) the path leading to the unsafe behavior phenomenon is not unique. Therefore, the high and unsafe behavior configuration of construction workers is summarized as “psychological cognition scarcity type,” “institutional environment scarcity type,” and “attitude-climate scarcity type”; (3) compared with “psychological cognitive scarcity type” and “institutional environment scarcity type,” “attitude-climate scarcity type” is more likely to cause unsafe behavior of construction workers; (4) a lower level of safety attitude or safety climate is more likely to cause high and unsafe behavior of construction workers; and (5) the non-high and unsafe behavior driving mechanism for construction workers is “comprehensive,” and there is an asymmetric relationship with the driving mechanism of the unsafe behavior of high construction workers. The research conclusions of this paper can help to broaden the theoretical framework of social cognition and provide new ideas and methods for how to improve unsafe behavior.

Section: Questionnaire Collection and Recovery Unsafe Behavior Data C...mentioning

confidence: 99%

How Do Psychological Cognition and Institutional Environment Affect the Unsafe Behavior of Construction Workers?—Research on fsQCA Method

Yuan

Chen

et al. 2022

“…However, previous studies seem to neglect the particularity of NGCWs. Moreover, the majority of these studies only focused on the relationships between antecedents and unsafe behavior, such as emotional exhaustion ( Ju et al, 2016 ), safety habits ( Mohajeri et al, 2021 ), and perceived safety climate ( Seo, 2005 ). Although these research hypotheses contribute to the establishment of theoretical models and have some theoretical significance, there are still certain limitations.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In the field of safety science, current research on motivation still focuses on the measurement and examination of the influence between two variables (e.g., Panuwatwanich et al, 2017 ; Lim et al, 2018 ; Ansori et al, 2021 ; Mohajeri et al, 2021 ). Little scholarly attention has been paid to the formation mechanism of construction workers’ unsafe acts from the perspective of motivation, that is, the pathway between motivation and unsafe behavior of construction workers has not been sufficiently portrayed.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Formation Mechanism and Dynamic Evolution Laws About Unsafe Behavior of New Generation of Construction Workers Based on China’s Construction Industry: Application of Grounded Theory and System Dynamics

Wang

et al. 2022

Construction workers’ unsafe behavior is a major cause of safety accidents and injuries, therefore, a profound understanding of the formation process and evolution laws about construction workers’ unsafe behavior is conducive to taking measures to prevent incidents. At present, the new generation of construction workers (NGCWs) born after 1980 are gradually becoming the main force at construction sites in China. Given that generational differences of construction workers can cause the discrepancies in their thoughts and attitudes when engaging in safety-related activities, this study aims to investigate the formation mechanism and dynamic evolution laws about NGCWs’ unsafe behavior based on the context of China’s construction industry. From the perspective of behavior motivation, in-depth semi-structured interviews with 18 NGCWs and 7 grassroots managers were conducted, and data analysis followed a three-step coding process based on grounded theory. Through continuous comparison, abstraction and analysis, the stimulus-organism-response theory was introduced and expanded to construct a three-stage formation mechanism model. On this basis, the causal diagram and stock flow diagram were developed based on system dynamics principles to reflect the dynamic feedback relationships of the factors in the static formation mechanism model, and simulation was carried out using Vensim PLE software. The results show that three types of internal needs and three types of external incentives stimulate corresponding motivations for NGCWs’ unsafe behavior. Two types of individual factors, five types of situational factors and behavior result play an influencing role in the decision-making process of externalizing motivation into behavior. Under the synergistic effect of multiple factors, the level of unsafe behavior displays a downward trend, and the rate of decrease is slow first and then fast. Furthermore, among individual factors and situational factors, safety awareness and safety management system have the most significant effect on the level of unsafe behavior, while situational factors play a more obvious role. The findings can provide theoretical support and practical references to China’s construction companies and government departments for the purpose of improving NGCWs’ unsafe behavior.

“…Scholars mainly analyze the influencing factors of construction workers’ unsafe behavior from following four aspects: human, material, management, and environment. For example, psychological capital ( Eid et al, 2012 ), physiology ( Yang et al, 2021 ), safety awareness and attitude ( Mohajeri et al, 2021 ; Liang et al, 2022 ), and work experience ( Alizadeh et al, 2015 ; Rey-Merchán et al, 2021 ) are human factors; personal protective equipment ( Amiri et al, 2014 ) and construction equipment ( Castillo-Rosa et al, 2017 ) are material factors; safety promotion policy ( Man et al, 2021 ), safety training ( Man et al, 2021 ), safety atmosphere ( Liao et al, 2014 ), safety supervision ( Fang et al, 2015 ), safety management, and safety culture ( Wang et al, 2016 ; Asilian-Mahabadi et al, 2018 ) are management factors; and working environment ( Harsini et al, 2021 ) and social environment ( Aven and Renn, 2009 ; Ma et al, 2021 ) are environmental factors. However, these studies only focus on the explicit analysis of the influencing factors of construction workers’ unsafe behavior, and few studies have focused on the implicit correlation analysis between the influencing factors.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Study on Influencing Factors of Construction Workers’ Unsafe Behavior Based on Text Mining

2022

The unsafe behavior of construction workers is the key cause of safety accidents. The accident investigation report contains rich experience and lessons, which can be used to prevent and reduce the occurrence of safety accidents. In order to draw lessons from the accident and realize knowledge sharing and reuse, this paper uses text mining technology to analyze the data of 500 construction accident investigation reports in Shenzhen, China. Firstly, a Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) topic model is used to identify the unsafe behavior of construction workers and its influencing factors. Then, with the help of Social Network Analysis, the importance of influencing factors and the relationship between them are identified. The results show that weak safety awareness, operating regulations, supervision dereliction of duty, equipment resources, and inadequate supervision of the construction party are the key and important factors. It is also found that there are correlations between weak safety awareness and supervision dereliction of duty, between equipment resources and poor construction environment, between organization and coordination and inadequate supervision of the construction party, and between operating regulations and hidden dangers investigation. This study not only helps to improve the theoretical system in the field of construction workers’ unsafe behavior but also helps managers to find the key control direction of construction safety, so as to effectively curb unsafe behavior of construction workers and improve the level of safety management.