Three studies addressed tunnel vision in industrial incident investigation. Study 1
surveyed professional investigators regarding how prior knowledge affects their
investigative conclusions. Studies 2 and 3 experimentally explored the true impact of a
priori information on investigative behaviour as well as the effectiveness of a debiasing
intervention. Findings from Study 1 demonstrate that investigators typically know the
people, position and equipment involved in the industrial event and they perceive this
information as largely beneficial in their investigations. Study 2 (undergraduates) and
Study 3 (professional investigators) employed a mock industrial investigation and found
that prior knowledge about worker or equipment safety biased undergraduate- and
professional-investigators’ responses. However, bias was effectively reduced with “tunnel
vision education.” Professional investigators demonstrated a greater sophistication in their
investigative decision making compared to undergraduates. The similarities and
differences between undergraduate and professional responding are discussed. / Graduate / 0451 / 0633 / 0624
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:uvic.ca/oai:dspace.library.uvic.ca:1828/4999 |
| Date | 28 October 2013 |
| Creators | MacLean, Carla Lindsay |
| Contributors | Brimacombe, C. A. Elizabeth, Lindsay, D. Stephen |
| Source Sets | University of Victoria |
| Language | English, English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Rights | Available to the World Wide Web |
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