Accident Proneness

Accident Proneness: Research in the Occurrence, Causation, and Prevention of Road Accidents deals with concept of accident proneness. The concept has had a checkered career, from the early British work whose high scientific standard has been universally acknowledged, through a period when the concept was extended beyond the sound basis which had been laid, to a period of reaction when doubt was thrown on the very existence of such a notion. The book examines in detail the arguments brought forward by the proponents of both sides, and, more importantly, studies in detail the facts and figures quoted in support. The book is organized into two sections: the first deals with the validity and usefulness of the concept of accident proneness; the second discusses new statistical techniques to evaluate the concept of accident proneness. The book demonstrates the existence of personality-related behavior patterns, which make people differentially prone to traffic accidents. This book is an important contribution to an important field. It is written in a style which should make it understandable (and even enjoyable) to more than the psychological experts to whom it is addressed in the first place.

Technology demands uniformity from human beings who encounter it. People encountering technology, however, differ from one another. Thinkers in the early twentieth century, observing the awful consequences of interactions between humans and machines—death by automobiles or dismemberment by factory machinery, for example—developed the idea of accident proneness: the tendency of a particular person to have more accidents than most people. In tracing this concept from its birth to its disappearance at the end of the twentieth century, Accident Prone offers a unique history of technology focused not on innovations but on their unintended consequences. Here, John C. Burnham shows that as the machine era progressed, the physical and economic impact of accidents coevolved with the rise of the insurance industry and trends in twentieth-century psychology. After World War I, psychologists determined that some people are more accident prone than others. This designation signaled a shift in social strategy toward minimizing accidents by diverting particular people away from dangerous environments. By the 1960s and 1970s, however, the idea of accident proneness gradually declined, and engineers developed new technologies to protect all people, thereby introducing a hidden, but radical, egalitarianism. Lying at the intersection of the history of technology, the history of medicine and psychology, and environmental history, Accident Prone is an ambitious intellectual analysis of the birth, growth, and decline of an idea that will interest anyone who wishes to understand how Western societies have grappled with the human costs of modern life.

Accident Proneness: Research in the Occurrence, Causation, and Prevention of Road Accidents deals with concept of accident proneness. The concept has had a checkered career, from the early British work whose high scientific standard has been universally acknowledged, through a period when the concept was extended beyond the sound basis which had been laid, to a period of reaction when doubt was thrown on the very existence of such a notion. The book examines in detail the arguments brought forward by the proponents of both sides, and, more importantly, studies in detail the facts and figures q.

Occupational safety and health management theory is now rightly focused on pro-activity, risk assessment and management. But it remains important that organizations know what they need to do when accidents happen, both to comply with legislation and to extract all the information from the incident to improve their health and safety management. Tolley’s Workplace Accident Handbook presents in a single volume what needs to be done when an accident occurs – from emergency procedures and legal reporting requirements through to formal investigations and possible legal proceedings. In this new edition, chapters on first aid and accident investigation reports have been added and the rehabilitation chapter has been updated to cover the latest insurance industry initiatives. The Handbook also shows how to learn from the accident data gathered and how to implement recommendations into a company's health and safety management system. The text is supported by checklists, case studies and ready-to-use forms and templates. Health and Safety practitioners in all industries will find this Handbook is packed full of practical and legal advice. It will also be of use to lawyers dealing with accident claims, insurance risk managers, emergency planning, first aid, and enforcement officers, as well as to students on health and safety and specialist accident investigation courses. Mark Tyler is a Chartered Safety and Health Practitioner and a leading Solicitor in the area of health and safety law who has worked on numerous high profile cases such as rail crashes and legionnaires disease. His expertise is supplemented with the practical knowledge of other experts in their individual subject areas.

“Gripping, page-turning material . . . a new way of thinking about survival in a world filled with hazards and distractions.” —Charles Duhigg, author of Smarter Faster Better and The Power of Habit A safety expert reveals why few of us are as careful as we think we are, and what we can do about it. As doctors and medical researchers work busily to extend our lives, more people each year are figuring out ways to cut them short. In fact, after a hundred years of steady decline, the rate at which people are being injured (or worse) in everyday accidents is increasing. Blame car crashes, pedestrian fatalities, home-improvement projects gone wrong, medical mistakes, home fires—not to mention all the crazy things that kids are into these days. And the problem seems to be spinning out of control. Steve Casner has devoted his career to studying the psychology of safety, and he knows there’s not a safety warning we won’t ignore or a foolproof device we can’t turn into an implement of disaster. Casner details the psychological traps that prevent us from being more careful. They’re the same whether you’re a pilot, a Hollywood stuntwoman, a parent, or the owner of a clogged dishwasher you’re trying to fix with a screwdriver. Then he shows us gripping real examples of how and when injuries happen, so we know exactly what we should really be worrying about. Careful arms readers with the latest science on how our sometimes fallible minds work, with countless takeaways to incorporate at home, at work, and everywhere in between. This book will help us keep our fingers attached in the kitchen, our kids afloat at the pool, and our teens safe behind the wheel, and demonstrates the many other ways we can maximize our chances of getting through the day in one piece.

This book discusses several methodological problems in traffic psychology which are not currently recognized as such. Summarizing and analyzing the available research, it is found that there are a number of commonly made assumptions about the validity of methods that have little backing, and that many basic problems have not been researched at all. Suggestions are made as to further studies that should be made to address some of these problems. The book is primarily intended for traffic/transport researchers, but should also be useful for specialized education at a higher level (doctoral students and transportation specialists) as well as officials who require a good grasp of methodology to be able to evaluate research.

Since the early 1970s there has been a considerable growth in the literature published on the topic of human reliability. However, the main emphasis has been on technical aspects of human reliability, rather than on an integrated safety approach combining safety engineering, organization and human factors. Up till now, information on the subject of occupational safety which covers human reliability as one aspect has been widely scattered in technical reviews or briefly mentioned in textbooks.This book provides a comprehensive overview on occupational safety with special emphasis on the human element. Examples of empirical studies as well as suggestions for practical measures are included to help in the understanding and application of the contents of the text. Although the prime objective of the book is to cover occupational safety from a human factors point of view, nevertheless some of the related areas are also discussed. Among others, they include problem solving in complex systems, judgmental and heuristic biases in decision making as well as characteristics of decision support systems in high risk industry. The inclusion of these topics clearly indicates the shift in attention of occupational safety from work activities on the shop floor to tasks of operators and supervisors in automated and semi-automated systems.The text will prove useful to students of psychology and human factors engineering. Additionally, it holds great utility for persons with an engineering background, such as industrial engineers, quality control engineers, system and design engineers and safety practitioners.