Behavior-based safety feedback is increasingly used by organizations to reduce the frequency and severity of work-related injuries. Improvements in safety performance have been demonstrated in numerous settings following behavior-based (BB) safety feedback. The relative impact of global, specific, and social comparison BB feedback on safety behaviors was assessed in the current study. A 2 Feedback Level (Specific, Global) X 2 Feedback Type (Social Comparison, No Social Comparison) analysis of covariance was used to test the hypothesis that specific, social comparison feedback would lead to the greatest improvement in safety percent safe scores. Participants were 97 employees from Shifts 1 and 2 of a soft-drink bottling company in southeastern United States. Results from the study demonstrated a main effect for feedback type. Social comparison feedback led to significantly higher percent safe scores than no social comparison feedback conditions (M=.78 and .68, respectively). Follow-up chi-square analyses and practical considerations suggest global/SCF is optimal for improving safety performance. Limitations of the study and future implications for BB safety feedback research are provided / Ph. D.

This study examines safety perceptions of manufacturing employees involved in a safety behavioral modification process, and the perceptions of employees who are not involved in the same process, based on the idea that such a process helps to decrease injuries in the workplace. The Neal-Griffin Safety Climate/Safety Performance Instrument was used in a specific workplace to determine if race, gender, age, years of service, union membership, and education affect employees' perceptions of safety in an industrial/manufacturing setting. The results of this quantitative study found that, overall, the vast majority of the workers, regardless of demographic and group membership, provided relatively high survey ratings, which indicate that they had positive perceptions regarding their company's safety procedures and miscellaneous safety issues.