Workplace Health and Safety

Journal of Occupational Health Psychology 2000, Vol. 5, No. 3, 347-358

Copyright 2000 by the Educational Publishing Foundation 1076-8998/00/$5.00 DOI: 10.1037fl1076-8998.5.3.347

Perceptions of Safety at Work: A Framework for Linking Safety Climate to Safety Performance, Knowledge, and Motivation
Mark A. Griffin Queensland University of Technology Andrew Neal University of Queensland

Research in the areas of organizational climate and work performance was used to develop a framework for measuring perceptions of safety at work. The framework distinguished perceptions of the work environment from perceptions of performance related to safety. Two studies supported application of the framework to employee perceptions of safety in the workplace. Safety compliance and safety participation were distinguished as separate components of safetyrelated performance. Perceptions of knowledge about safety and motivation to perform safely influenced individual reports of safety performance and also mediated the link between safety climate and safety performance. Specific dimensions of safety climate were identified and constituted a higher order safety climate factor. The results support conceptualizing safety climate as an antecedent to safety performance in organizations.

The present study combines theories of individual performance (Borman & Motowidlo, 1993; Campbell, McCloy, Oppler, & Sager, 1993) with theories of organizational climate (L. A. James & James, 1989; L. R. James & Mclntyre, 1996) to develop a framework for investigating perceptions of safety in organizations. This framework provides a link between perceptions of the work environment and individual behavior within the work environment. We differentiate perceptions of the work environment, perceptions of individual behavior in the workplace, and mediational processes thought to underlie individual work performance. These distinctions are important because they allow systematic assessment of conceptually

References: Anderson, J. R. (1983). The architecture of cognition. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Anderson, N. R., & West, M. A. (1998). Measuring climate for work group innovation: Development and validation of the team climate inventory. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 19, 235-258. Bentler, P. M. (1990). Comparative fit indexes in structural models. Psychological Bulletin, 107, 238-246. Bentler, P. M., & Bonnet, D. G. (1980). Significance tests and goodness of fit in the analysis of covariance structures. Psychological Bulletin, 88, 588-606. Borman, W. C., & Motowidlo, S. J. (1993). Expanding the criterion domain to include elements of contextual performance. In N. Schmitt, W. C. Borman, & Associates (Eds.), Personnel selection in organizations (pp. 71-98). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Brown, R. L., & Holmes, H. (1986). The use of a factoranalytic procedure for assessing the validity of an employee safety climate model. Accident Analysis and Prevention, 18, 455-470. Brown, S. P., & Leigh, T. W. (1996). A new look at psychological climate and its relationship to job involvement, effort, and performance. Journal of Applied Psychology, 81, 358-368. Burke, M. J., Borucki, C. C., & Hurley, A. E. (1992). Reconceptualizing psychological climate in a retail service environment: A multiple stakeholder perspective. Journal of Applied Psychology, 77, 717-729. Campbell, J. P., Gasser, M. B., & Oswald, F. L. (1996). The substantive nature of performance variability. In K. R. Murphy (Ed.), Individual differences and behavior in organizations (pp. 258-299). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass 358 GRIFFIN AND NEAL Klein, K. J., & Spotra, J. S. (1996). The challenge of innovation implementation. Academy of Management Review, 21, 1055-1080. McCloy, R. A., Campbell, J. P., & Cudeck, R. (1994). A confirmatory test of a model of performance determinants. Journal of Applied Psychology, 79, 493-503. McHenry, J. J., Hough, L. M., Toquam, J. L., Hanson, M. A., & Ashworth, S. (1990). Project A validity results: The relationship between predictor and criterion domains. Personnel Psychology, 43, 335-354. Medsker, G. J., Williams, L. J., & Holahan, P. J. (1994). A review of current practices for evaluating causal models in organizational behavior and human resources management research. Journal of Management, 20, 439-464. Morrison, D. L., Upton, D. M., & Cordery, J. (1997, April). Organizational climate and skill utilization. Paper presented to the 12th Annual Conference of the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology, St. Louis, MO. Motowidlo, S. J., & Van Scotter, J. R. (1994). Evidence that task performance should be distinguished from contextual performance. Journal of Applied Psychology, 79, 475-480. Niskanen, T. (1994). Assessing the safety environment in the work organization of road maintenance jobs. Accident Analysis and Prevention, 26, 27-39. Rundmo, T. (1994). Associations between safety and contingency measures and occupational accidents on offshore petroleum platforms. Scandinavian Journal of Work, Environment and Health, 20, 128-131. Schneider, B. (1990). The climate for service: An application of the climate construct. In B. Schneider (Ed.), Organizational climate and culture (pp. 383-412). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Schneider, B., Wheeler, J. K., & Cox, J. F. (1992). A passion for service: Using content analysis to explicate service climate themes. Journal of Applied Psychology, 77, 705-716. Wise, L. L., McHenry, J., & Campbell, J. P. (1990). Identifying optimal predictor composites and testing for generalizability across jobs and performance factors. Personnel Psychology, 43, 355-366. Wright, P. M., George, J. M., Farnsworth, S. R., & McMahan, G. C. (1993). Productivity and extra-role behavior: The effects of goals and incentives on spontaneous helping. Journal of Applied Psychology, 78, 374-381. Zohar, D. (1980). Safety climate in industrial organizations: Theoretical and applied implications. Journal of Applied Psychology, 12, 78-85. Campbell, J. P., McCloy, R. A., Oppler, S. H., & Sager, C. E. (1993). A theory of performance. In N. Schmitt, W. C. Borman, & Associates (Eds.), Personnel selection in organizations (pp. 35-70). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Cox, S., & Tait, R. (1991). Reliability, safety and risk management: An integrated approach. Oxford, England: Butterworth-Heinemann. Dedobbeleer, N., & Beland, F. (1991). A safety climate measure for construction sites. Journal of Safety Research, 22, 97-103. DeJoy, D. M. (1994). Managing safety in the workplace: An attribution theory analysis and model. Journal of Safety Research, 25, 3-17. Hayes, B. E., Perander, J., Smecko, T., & Trask, J. (1998). Measuring perceptions of workplace safety: Development and validation of the work safety scale. Journal of Safety Research, 29, 145-161. Hofmann, D. A., Jacobs, R. R., & Landy, F. J. (1995). High reliability process industries: Individual, micro, and macro organizational influences on safety performance. Journal of Safety Research, 26, 131-149. Hofmann, D. A., & Stetzer, A. (1996). A cross-level investigation of factors influencing unsafe behaviors and accidents. Personnel Psychology, 49, 307-339. Hofmann, D. A., & Stetzer, A. (1999). The role of safety climate and communication in accident interpretation: Implications for learning from negative events. Academy of Management Journal, 41, 644-657. Hogan, J., & Roberts, B. W. (1996). Issues and non-issues in the fidelity-bandwidth trade-off. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 17, 627-637. Hu, L., & Bentler, P. M. (1999). Cutoff criteria for fit indexes in covariance structure analysis: Conventional criteria versus new alternatives. Structural Equation Modeling, 6, 1-55. James, L. A., & James, L. R. (1989). Integrating work environment perceptions: Explorations into the measurement of meaning. Journal of Applied Psychology, 74, 739-751. James, L. R., & Mclntyre, M. D. (1996). Perceptions of organizational climate. In K. Murphy (Ed.), Individual differences and behavior in organizations (pp. 416-450). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. James, L. R., James, L. A., & Ashe, D. (1990). The meaning of organizations: The role of condition and values. In B. Schneider (Ed.), Organizational climate and culture (pp. 40-84). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Joreskog, K. G., & Sorbem, D. (1989). LISREL VII." User 's reference and guide. Mooresville, IN: Scientific Software. Kanfer, R., & Ackerman, P. L. (1989). Motivation and cognitive abilities: An integrative/aptitude-treatment interaction approach to skill acquisition. Journal of Applied Psychology, 74, 657-690. Katz, D., & Kahn, R. L. (1966). The social psychology of organizations. New York: Wiley. Received June 9, 1999 Revision received D e c e m b e r 6, 1999 A c c e p t e d January 19, 2000 •