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  • Enhancing Construction Managers’ Risk Perception and Lowering Risk Tolerance toward Unsafe Behaviors Through Experiential Safety Training

This content will become publicly available on January 1, 2026

Title: Enhancing Construction Managers’ Risk Perception and Lowering Risk Tolerance toward Unsafe Behaviors Through Experiential Safety Training
The training effect can be enhanced when trainees/learners interact with real-world environments and construct personal knowledge from those direct experiences. Leveraging such experiential learning strategies for occupational training has been widely discussed due to its effectiveness. The construction industry has also been focusing on experiential safety training to address the limitations in conventional classroom-based training, such as passive learning and limited interaction with actual physical hazards. Recently, government organizations and construction companies have started to operate safety training facilities, where trainees can physically experience the negative consequences of unsafe behaviors (without actual injuries). Although the effect of experiential safety training at those facilities has been anecdotally noted, no study has empirically investigated its effectiveness in enhancing trainees’ risk perception toward unsafe behaviors. To this end, this study examined the effectiveness of experiential safety training in enhancing construction managers’ risk perception toward workers’ unsafe behaviors and their intention to stop workers from working in dangerous situations. The results, based on answers to survey questions showing scene images of unsafe behavior related to the risk of a fall, show that construction managers who participated in experiential safety training perceived a higher risk regarding workers’ unsafe behaviors in less obviously risky situations, and exhibited a stronger intention to immediately stop workers from working in subtly unsafe conditions. This study contributes empirical evidence about the effectiveness of experiential safety training at safety training centers, thereby promoting the wide adoption of experiential safety training and advancing safety engineering and management strategies in the construction industry.  more » « less
Award ID(s):
2302819 2302821 2302820
PAR ID:
10584400
Author(s) / Creator(s):
; ; ; ;
Publisher / Repository:
Journal of Management in Engineering
Date Published:
Journal Name:
Journal of Management in Engineering
Volume:
41
Issue:
1
ISSN:
0742-597X
Page Range / eLocation ID:
01-17
Subject(s) / Keyword(s):
Risk Perception, Risk Tolerance, Safety Training
Format(s):
Medium: X Size: 2.3MB Other: PDF
Size(s):
2.3MB
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
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