Losses resulting from traumatic injuries and occupational disease are prevalent in the small business sector of Australian industry. Although the true size of the problem is unclear, it is estimated that the losses amount to more than $8 billion annually. The hazard control measures to counter these losses are largely known and are available to small businesses but they are not widely adopted. Regulators and other bodies have employed a range of intervention strategies to influence decision-makers in small businesses but most have focussed on the dissemination of printed materials or broadbased advertising campaigns with limited success......... The research concludes that the listening processes at the heart of social marketing add to the methods already used in the OHS discipline by forcing the marketer to listen to the subjective assessment of risk as perceived by targets as well as to question the evidence base that supports the legitimacy and efficacy of the proposed intervention. The TTM was found to be a useful means of categorising small business decision-maker behaviour and assessing the readiness for change of individuals and therefore the messages that are needed to unfreeze behaviour. The TTM also provides a tool for evaluation of the impact of an intervention.As a result of this research it is suggested that opinion leaders, who are employed within a social marketing model to diffuse information, multiply the effort of those wishing to increase the adoption of an innovation. Thus engagement of opinion leaders by an OHS authority for the communication of risk control messages may be more cost-effective than attempting to visit every workplace within an industry group. Thus, although social marketing is not in the general repertoire of OHS interventions, it appears to be extremely useful as a framework for interventions and, when used in concert with a stages of change model, provides natural lead indicators for evaluating the impact of OHS interventions. Application of social marketing to people who have the responsibility for the health and safety of others was unique. / Doctor of Philosphy
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ADTP/266116 |
| Date | January 2006 |
| Creators | Cowley, Stephen |
| Publisher | University of Ballarat |
| Source Sets | Australiasian Digital Theses Program |
| Detected Language | English |
| Rights | Copyright Stephen Cowley |
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