Safety climate and attitude as evaluation measures of organizational safety

Abstract

The main aim of this research is to develop a set of evaluation measures for safety attitudes and safety climate. Specifically it is intended: (a) to test the instruments; (b) to identify the essential dimensions of the safety climate in the airport ground handling companies; (c) to assess the quality of the differences in the safety climate for each company and its relation to the accident rate; (d) to analyse the relationship between attitudes and safety climate; and (e) to evaluate the influences of situational and personal factors on both safety climate and attitude. The study sample consisted of 166 subjects from three airport companies. Specifically, this research was centred on ground handling departments. The factor analysis of the safety climate instrument resulted in six factors which explained 69.8% of the total variance. We found significant differences in safety attitudes and climate in relation to type of enterprise.

Introduction

This research is part of a wider European project (the SCARF project) for the development, evaluation and delivery of training courses aimed the improvement of the safety standards in a number of enterprises. The instruments developed during the initial stage, as well as being an evaluation of behaviour (of which the results will be provided in a further publication), will also be used to evaluate the successful outcome of the training courses.

The main notion which has directed this research is that of taking a realistic approach to the complexity of safety aspects in the above mentioned enterprises, avoiding an exclusive focus on the design of the technical system or on individual factors. Organizational factors should also be taken into account as they play a relevant role in safety.

The significance of organizational factors has begun to gain acceptance since the Seventies onwards (e.g. Powell et al., 1971). Some findings indicate that low-accident companies were eminently better than high-accident companies in terms of the management's commitment to safety, in employee training, the standard of selection procedures and absenteeism and turnover. In that sense, Reason's model (Reason, 1993) is an example of present attempts to adopt a wider perspective.

Nevertheless, though researchers have confirmed the relevance of social and organizational factors (Griffiths, 1985; Syroit, 1985), the practical significance of these factors in the prevention of accidents remains undetermined. It is necessary to achieve a greater integration of both the accident/incident and the organizational literatures. Some efforts of coordination have been observed in recent years, especially from a descriptive view. Accordingly the concepts of safety climate and safety culture (i.e. Pidgeon and O'Leary, 1994; Zohar, 1980), have in the last decade entered the accident and safety literature. However, even though the significance of promoting an organizational climate that encourages safety is now being considered, its relationship with organizational safety still remains unexplored (Sheehy and Chapman, 1987). Neither have clear approaches been developed in relation to company intervention (Robinson, 1982).

This is no easy task, since it should be started by a conceptual and methodological definition of the organizational climate concept. In spite of its relevance for organizational change, it is very vague. However, there is relative agreement among scientists about the impact that the climate may have on processes such as communication, decision-making, problem solving, conflict solving, attitudes, motivation, etc. and therefore on result variables such as satisfaction or performance. Little research has, however, used the climate variable as an intervening one (Silva Vázquez, 1992).

Perhaps these relationships are not so easy or simple. We are facing the dilemma of what needs to be modified, whether it is the company's structural and procedural elements or whether we should act directly upon the individuals' attitudes and behaviour or both (Anderson, 1985).

One of the most important controversies concerning climate concept is related to the influence of personal factors (e.g. work experience, time in position, age) and situational factors (e.g. position level, functional area) on individual perceptions. This controversy has influenced, among others, the development of different conceptualizations of climate, that is, psychological, aggregate, collective and organizational climates. There are nevertheless no studies that directly analyse the role of these factors on the climate (Rousseau, 1988). Nowadays, as many researchers have pointed out (e.g. Schneider and Reichers, 1983), organizational and individual factors interact to produce climate-related perceptions. One of the aims of our study is to evaluate the possible influence of these factors on safety climate as well as on safety attitudes.

On the other hand, as a consequence of the difficulties encountered by general approaches, some authors have focused their research on specific climates. A primary assumption is to admit the existence of different climates within each company (Schneider and Reichers, 1983). Specifically in the field of company safety, Zohar (1980)research is the most representative of this tendency. Climate is defined as a set of molar perceptions, shared by individuals with their work environment, which are valid as references for guiding behaviour in the execution of tasks during day-to-day eventualities.

This author has explored the relationship between safety climate and accident rate. The data from the climate scale used describes the following dimensions:

• perceived management attitudes toward safety;

• perceived effects of safe conduct on promotion;

• perceived effects of safe conduct on social status;

• perceived organizational status of safety officer;

• perceived importance and effectiveness of safety training;

• perceived risk level at work place; and

• perceived effectiveness of enforcement versus guidance in promoting safety (Zohar, 1980).

These dimensions permit the distinction between high-accident and low-accident companies.

Brown and Holmes (1986)tested Zohar's model, obtaining a tri-dimensional model, that is:

• management's concern for employees' well-being;

• management action to cope with this concern;

• the employees' physical risk.

Recently, Cooper and Phillips (1994)have also developed a safety climate measure.

A second aspect in this study deals with safety attitudes. Hannaford (1976)defines these as “a readiness to respond effectively and safely, particularly in tension-producing situations”. The study of attitudes has progressed considerably since the 1960s when attitudes were unimportant influences on, and weak predictors of behaviours (Eagly, 1992). From that time a range of devices have been documented demonstrating that attitudes can influence behaviour. Many conditions have also been developed in which attitudes are essential behaviour predictors (see Glendon and McKenna, 1995), particularly in their relationship to safe behaviours (Donald and Canter, 1993).

In this respect, it is relevant for us to explore here the relationship between attitudes as a variable at the individual level and (a) the general safety level, and (b) the safety climate at the companies in this survey. Attitude and safety climate research have steered this study towards exploring the actual relationship between these factors and safety in companies.