Merging habitus into safety risk management: A case from the U.S. construction industry

Construction industry has been continuously suffering the safety risks and injuries. According to the U.S. Department of Labor, 19.4% of nationwide workplace fatal injury occurred in construction between 2003 and 2011. Technical efforts have been directly endeavored to impact safe working performance but most shown as less effective. This research aims to find out an appropriate method to actively merge modern technology and safety culture into the safety risk management. A safety issue of electrical hazard from the U.S. construction industry was selected for case study. Based on the analysis of the electrical safety risk in construction, it is found that a large portion of fatalities and injuries are related to workers´ unsafe acts and lack of awareness. An innovative method is proposed that merges safe habitus into the risk management through information technology. An application which adopts this method is also demonstrated.