Developmental approach of safety in ergonomics/human factors: insights of constructed safety in six work environments

This article brings together works on the concept of constructed safety in ergonomics, carried out over the last twenty-five years. Firstly, we situate this approach to safety in relation to previously developed existing models previously developed (e.g. regulated and managed safety) with regard to the development of activity-centred ergonomics. We then present six research actions in activity-centred ergonomics from a selection of different fields, from small companies to the industry of the future in an international group: public works, hospitals, aeronautical industry, railway transport, agriculture, and chemical industry, in order to describe constructed safety applications. The results highlight that constructed safety is respectively raised by mutual knowledge between workers and management, collective decision making, collective reflexive work on safety rules, spatiotemporal articulation of the different safety sources, knowledge integration on pesticide exposure situations by designers and regulation, social regulation sustaining risk understanding and safety aspect involving a diversity of actors (workers, preventionists, managers, local residents and public authorities). By focusing on the analysis of actual safety practices in real work and real exposure situations, constructed safety aims to account for the way in which safety is deployed on a daily basis to meet production and health objectives. This understanding contributes to the design of safe work systems in a developmental way and to propose an operating model of constructed safety. Safety issues are paramount in work environments where high-risk work activities take place. This article proposes an operating model of 'constructed safety' to help address these health and safety issues. This developmental approach to safety is based on the models and methods of activity-centred ergonomics.