The Relationship between Safety Locus of Control and Occupational Trauma: a Cross-Sectional Study

Opinions about the occupational trauma causes are significantly different, which have a great impact on the nature of interventions and may improve health and safety (H&S) performance. Locus of control can be one of the most important determinants of the H&S performance. Because of the importance of this variable in relation to the prevention of occupational trauma in work environments, this study was aimed to investigate the relationship between safety locus of control and occupational trauma. This cross-sectional study was conducted on 346 employees of a cosmetic industry. The instruments included a demographic questionnaire, safety locus of control questionnaire, and self-reported occupational trauma questionnaire. Data were analyzed using descriptive and analytical statistical tests in IBM SPSS software version 22.0. Of the total number of participants in the study, 22.5% (76 people) were reported that they had experienced an occupational trauma in the last year and 77.5% (262) did not have occupational trauma. Four subjects did not respond to the occupational trauma-related questions. The mean score of safety locus of control in the study group was 38.87±5.8 and was higher than the mean value of the questionnaire (36.0). The results showed that the safety locus of control had a significant relationship with occupational trauma (p<0.01). These findings confirmed the results of previous studies, which had been carried out mostly in non-industrial areas. The results have indicated that the place of safety locus of control had a significant effect on occupational trauma in industrial areas, so it can be considered as a predictor of occupational trauma occurrence.