Occupational Safety and Health

Abstract

Occupational health and safety reflects the effect of the work environment on employees, groups and work units in organizations, and organizations as a whole. This chapter provides an overview of the research on workplace safety and specifically discusses safety training, regulatory focus, safety climate, leadership, and job design as they relate to safety. Additionally, the literature on occupational health, drawing heavily on the occupational stress literature, discusses the employee-employer relationship from a psychological contract perspective, including climate for sexual harassment, collective burnout and its contagion, recovery, and organizational wellness programs. Particular attention is given to primary interventions to enhance safety, health, and well-being of employees and to eliminate the harmful effects that may arise through individual characteristics, group/work unit factors, and aspects of the organization.

Organisational Health Behavior Climate: Organisations Can Encourage Healthy Eating and Physical Exercise

“…Research and practice on employee health have changed notably over the years (Tetrick & Peiró, ). For instance, to maintain employee health, it is not enough to prevent illnesses and injuries, but to promote health and well‐being in a proactive way.…”

Intrapreneurial Self-Capital and Sustainable Innovative Behavior within Organizations

“…Despite the aforementioned limitations, this study suggests that intrapreneurial self-capital could promote sustainable development within organizations [10,13], due to its relation to innovative behavior. Intrapreneurial self-capital also appears particularly useful in achieving the transition from innovation idea generation to implementation.…”

“…Innovative behavior is also strongly linked to sustainability. Innovation is a crucial aspect for organizations to face the challenges related to the Sustainable Development Goals, which were introduced by the United Nations (UN) [9], and to promote humane and productive organizations [10][11][12][13][14]. As studies regarding the psychology of sustainability and sustainable development have highlighted, innovative behaviors are necessary to meet sustainable project goals, as well as to achieve workers' growth and enrichment.…”

The Valencia Eustress-Distress Appraisal Scale (VEDAS): Validation of the Italian Version

“…These ongoing and repeated tensions can lead workers to experience more stress [4]. In this context, the psychology of sustainability and sustainable development [5] represents a promising area of research and intervention for promoting healthy workers and organizations [6][7][8][9]. This agenda is aligned with the 17 sustainable development goals proposed by the United Nations [10], which highlight the importance of strengthening and advancing the development of individuals, families, communities, and organizations in order to promote sustainable development and global growth.…”

“…Organizations need to embrace a new awareness of the psychology of sustainability and sustainable development for human resources [5][6][7]. From this perspective, the focus is on developing workers as resources with the need to flourish, turning constraints into resources, and sustaining resilience in facing the challenges of the post-modern work environment [6,8,9,11]. A business is healthy [6,8,9,12,13], in terms of being a sustainable business for the present and for the future, when both the workers and the organization are able to thrive.…”