Ergonomic Behavioral and Workers’ Safety Perception in Khuzestan Petrochemical Company

Objectives: An effective safety management requires paying attention to human factors. One of the most important methods for achievement to accident prevention is using safety climate or safety culture. Moreover, some studies suggest that in most organizations behavior contributes to ۸۶-۹۶% of all injuries. This cross-sectional study was performed on the functional units’ workers of Khuzestan Petrochemical Company, in ۲۰۱۰. Methods: Data collection tools were safety climate questionnaire that has been presented by Kumar et al. (۲۰۰۹), Ergonomic Behavior Sampling and collected data was analyzed by SPSS ۱۶. Results: With reference to the results of a pilot study, a sample of ۱۱۴۷ was determined for Behavior Sampling. The numbers of returned valid questionnaires were ۱۳۴ out of ۱۵۱ and response rate was ۸۸.۷۴%. Questionnaire reliability assessed by Cronbach’s Alpha, was ۰.۹۲۸. Results indicated, management commitment and actions for safety, workers’ knowledge and compliance to safety, and workers’ attitudes towards safety, are those safety climate factors which have obtained the highest correlation coefficient with ergonomic behaviors and as predictors on multi-variants linear regression model for ergonomic behavior forecasting. Discussion: Results showed the importance of decreasing number of workers with negative safety climate. Also, results obligate paying attention to workers’ ergonomic behaviors in the workplace and their promotion.

Keywords:

Safety climate , Ergonomic behavior , Petrochemical company