• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.9 no.1
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• pp.53-58
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• 2018

Background: Since the Republic of Korea became a labor-force-importing country, the number of foreign workers has increased gradually, especially in the construction industry. The main objective of this study was to examine the differences in safety perception between domestic and foreign workers at Korean construction sites. Methods: A total of 891 Korean and foreign workers were surveyed: 140 foreign and 751 Korean workers. The general characteristics and 25 factors influencing safety perception were considered in the questionnaire. Regression and correlation analyses were conducted to examine the variables of workers' safety perception. Results: Differences of nationality (F = 7.379, p < 0.001) and workplace accidents were statistically significant for both domestic (F = 1.503, p < 0.05) and foreign workers (F = 7.868, p < 0.05). In contrast, age, education, and Korean language level were significant variables only for foreign workers. Correlation coefficients of $0.428^{**}$ for Korean and 0.148 for foreign workers between two items - namely, "management's commitment to safety" and "blaming staff when they make mistakes" - support the conclusion that foreign workers do not trust management's commitment to safety, while Korean workers have confidence in these commitments. Conclusion: Foreign workers' level of safety perception should rise to the same level as Korean workers, especially in terms of obeying safety rules, safety education performance, and safety beliefs. Therefore, an improvement plan for the Korean construction industry is suggested in order to have a better safety level at construction sites with foreign workers.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Safety
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• v.30 no.1
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• pp.119-126
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• 2015

The primary purpose of the general duty clause is to offer an extra measure of protection to employees in the workplace. Most standards implemented under OSHA are targeted at a specific hazard. The general duty clause, however allows inspectors to cite employers for exposing its employees to a recognized hazard that has not been specifically addressed in the regulations. Congress intended the general duty clause to be a limited means of advancing the purposes of the OSHAct. But OSHA has not always regarded the general duty clause as the limited means for protecting the safety and health of employees that Congress intented. OSHA attempted to expand the scope of the general duty clause, at times improperly, to make it a more flexible enforcement tool. OSHA's interpretation of each of the restrictions on the scope of the clause has changed over the years. In recent years the general duty clause has been utilized as a sometimes controversial mechanism for enforcement of safety guidelines that have not yet been specifically addressed by statute or regulation. The most notable example of this was application of the general duty clause to ergonomic hazards.

• Journal of the Korea Safety Management & Science
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• v.16 no.3
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• pp.45-54
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• 2014

The average injury rate in sawmilling industry for the last 5 years is 4.99%, which means that more than 200 injuries have occurred in that industry every year. Because the first step in risk assessment is the hazard identification, it is very important to know how to define the hazard and nature of harm. We analyzed 643 accident records of three years(2010-2012) and carried out site survey for the same cases. As a result, the most common types of work at the time of injury in sawmilling industry were removing jammed wood 81(12.8%), wood carrying task 52(8.1%), wood cutting 49(7.6%), travelling table log band saw 41(6.4%), maintenance 37(5.8%) etc. In addition, there were statistically significant differences in some analysis factors such as injured body parts, employment size, and handling material among different working places. Therefore, it is concluded that differentiated prevention efforts are necessary in each workplace.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.3 no.3
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• pp.155-165
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• 2012

Reflecting the current international trends toward proactive risk assessment and control at work with practical procedures, participatory action-oriented approaches are gaining importance in various sectors. The roles of these approaches in promoting the safety and health at work are discussed based on their recent experiences in preventing work-related risks and improving the quality of work life, particularly in small-scale workplaces. The emphasis placed on the primary prevention at the initiative of workers and managers is commonly notable. Participatory steps, built on local good practices, can lead to many workplace improvements when the focus is on locally feasible low-cost options in multiple aspects. The design and use of locally adjusted action toolkits play a key role in facilitating these improvements in each local situation. The effectiveness of participatory approaches relying on these toolkits is demonstrated by their spread to many sectors and by various intervention studies. In the local context, networks of trainers are essential in sustaining the improvement activities. With the adequate support of networks of trainers trained in the use of these toolkits, participatory approaches will continue to be the key factor for proactive risk management in various work settings.

• Journal of the Korea Safety Management & Science
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• v.16 no.4
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• pp.203-213
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• 2014

Sickness absence is one of the most important indicators for worker's health and occupational safety and health performance. Sickness absence is primarily depended upon sickness but psycho-social factors in workplace may moderate sickness absence. Even though worker is falling into illness, sickness absence can be prevented by job satisfaction. In Korea it is very difficult to find research output about the association of sickness absence with job satisfaction. This study is planned to investigate the effect of job satisfaction on sickness absence. The third Korean Working Conditions Survey done by Occupational Safety and Health Research Institute in 2011 was used to analyze by logistic regression analysis. The result has shown that job satisfaction has statistically significant effect on sickness absence and simultaneously diminish the effect of symptoms experience on sickness absence. The effect of job satisfaction is greater in short term sickness absence than in long term sickness absence. This study has some limitation because of the cross sectional data of Korean Working Conditions Survey. In future, sophisticated statistical analysis may be done with modelling.

• Journal of the Korea Safety Management & Science
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.9-18
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• 2011

Daily workers in construction sites rarely receive the benefit of systematic safety and health training as they are required to move from one construction site to another in response to the start, completion, and repetition of construction works. Also, small- to medium-sized construction sites often lack the capacity to train their workers. Therefore, as in the advanced countries, basic OSH training sheme for construction workers should be conducted in the industrial-level, rather than in individual workplace-level, to make the training more effective. By doing so, only workers with the basic safety training will be able to engage in construction works. Consequently, accidents in the construction industry will decrease, as workers themselves who are at the forefront of the construction worksites are empowered to play the central role in accident prevention activities.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.1 no.2
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• pp.158-166
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• 2010

Objectives: This study aimed to find gender distinctions in terms of the sociology of the population; to determine work-related factors; to analyze gender differences in daily living, work, sports, and art performances; and to identify gender-related factors that limited performance of daily living and work activities. Methods: A questionnaire was designed that included disabilities of the arm, shoulder, and hand (DASH), accident history, disease history, work duration at current workplace, marital status, job satisfaction, job autonomy, and physical demands of the job. Out of 1,853 workers surveyed, 1,173 questionnaires (63.3%; 987 males, 186 females) included responses to DASH disability and DASH optional work and were judged acceptable for analysis. Results: Upper extremity functional limitation during work and daily living was higher for females than males. The limitations for males increased according to their household work time, accident history, work duration, job satisfaction, physical demand, and job autonomy. Meanwhile, female workers' upper extremity discomfort was influenced by their disease history, job satisfaction, and physical demands. In addition, the size of the company affected male workers' upper extremity function, while marriage and hobbies influenced that of female workers. Conclusion: This study addressed sociodemographic factors and work-related factors that affect each gender's upper extremity function during daily living and working activities. Each factor had a different influence. Further studies are needed to identify the effect that role changes, not being influenced by risks at work, have on musculoskeletal disorders.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.2 no.2
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• pp.148-157
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• 2011

Objectives: Although compensation for occupational injuries and diseases is guaranteed in almost all nations, countries vary greatly with respect to how they organize workers' compensation systems. In this paper, we focus on three aspects of workers' compensation insurance in Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries - types of systems, employers' funding mechanisms, and coverage for injured workers - and their impacts on the actual frequencies of occupational injuries and diseases. Methods: We estimated a panel data fixed effect model with cross-country OECD and International Labor Organization data. We controlled for country fixed effects, relevant aggregate variables, and dummy variables representing the occupational accidents data source. Results: First, the use of a private insurance system is found to lower the occupational accidents. Second, the use of risk-based pricing for the payment of employer raises the occupational injuries and diseases. Finally, the wider the coverage of injured workers is, the less frequent the workplace accidents are. Conclusion: Private insurance system, fixed flat rate employers' funding mechanism, and higher coverage of compensation scheme are significantly and positively correlated with lower level of occupational accidents compared with the public insurance system, risk-based funding system, and lower coverage of compensation scheme.

• International conference on construction engineering and project management
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• 2020.12a
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• pp.96-102
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• 2020

The construction industry remains serious accidents, injuries, and fatalities due to it's unique, dynamic, and temporary nature. On workplace sites, Safety pre-task planning is one of the efforts to minimize injuries and help construction personnel to identify potential hazards. However, the working conditions are complicated. Many activities, including tasks or job steps, are executing at the same time and place. It may lead to an increase in the risks from simultaneous tasks. This paper contributes to addressing this issue by introducing a safety risk interaction analyzing framework. To accomplish this objective, accident reports of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) are investigated. The pairs of task incompatibility, which have time-space conflicts and lead to incidents, are found. Ontology technology is applied to build the risk database, in which the information is acquired, structuralized. The proposed system is expected to improve pre-task planning efficiency and relieve the burdens encountered by safety managers. A user scenario is also discussed to demonstrate how the ontology supports pre-task planning in practice.

• Journal of the Korea Safety Management & Science
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.15-23
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• 2023

This study analyzed effective capacity building education plans for public institution management supervisors. A survey was conducted on 635 management supervisors of public institutions (99 institutions) subject to the safety management rating system to understand the characteristics of educational participants and the impact of educational satisfaction on professionalism improvement after capacity building education. As a result of statistical analysis, the professional improvement according to the affiliation of educational participants was higher in the workplace and construction site divisions than in the research facility division, and the professional improvement according to the working period was higher for more than 15 years than for less than 5 years and less than 15 years. In addition, the quality of education had a significant positive (+) effect on the degree of professional improvement. This study can be used as basic data for further research related to capacity building education for public institution management supervisors