Multilevel Safety Climate and Safety Performance in the Construction Industry: Development and Validation of a Top-Down Mechanism

Ran Gao, Albert P.C. Chan, Wahyudi P. Utama and Hafiz Zahoor
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Ran Gao: Department of Building and Real Estate, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong 999077, China
Albert P.C. Chan: Department of Building and Real Estate, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong 999077, China
Wahyudi P. Utama: Department of Building and Real Estate, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong 999077, China
Hafiz Zahoor: Department of Building and Real Estate, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong 999077, China

IJERPH, 2016, vol. 13, issue 11, 1-14

Abstract: The character of construction projects exposes front-line workers to dangers and accidents. Safety climate has been confirmed to be a predictor of safety performance in the construction industry. This study aims to explore the underlying mechanisms of the relationship between multilevel safety climate and safety performance. An integrated model was developed to study how particular safety climate factors of one level affect those of other levels, and then affect safety performance from the top down. A questionnaire survey was administered on six construction sites in Vietnam. A total of 1030 valid questionnaires were collected from this survey. Approximately half of the data were used to conduct exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and the remaining data were submitted to structural equation modeling (SEM). Top management commitment (TMC) and supervisors’ expectation (SE) were identified as factors to represent organizational safety climate (OSC) and supervisor safety climate (SSC), respectively, and coworkers’ caring and communication (CCC) and coworkers’ role models (CRM) were identified as factors to denote coworker safety climate (CSC). SEM results show that OSC factor is positively related to SSC factor and CSC factors significantly. SSC factor could partially mediate the relationship between OSC factor and CSC factors, as well as the relationship between OSC factor and safety performance. CSC factors partially mediate the relationship between OSC factor and safety performance, and the relationship between SSC factor and safety performance. The findings imply that a positive safety culture should be established both at the organizational level and the group level. Efforts from all top management, supervisors, and coworkers should be provided to improve safety performance in the construction industry.

Keywords: construction safety; safety climate; safety performance; structural equation modeling (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (10)

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