Journal of Safety Research 40 (2009) 277283

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Journal of Safety Research

j o u r n a l h o m e p a g e : w w w. e l s ev i e r. c o m / l o c a t e / j s r

Effects of safety climate on safety norm violations: exploring the mediating role of
attitudinal ambivalence toward personal protective equipment
Nicoletta Cavazza , Alessandra Serpe 1
Universit di Modena-Reggio Emilia, via Allegri 9, 42100 Reggio Emilia

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Available online 4 August 2009 Problem: Research on the role of organizational and psychosocial factors in inuencing risk behaviors and the
likelihood of injury at work showed that safety climate also has great impact on workers behavior. However,
Keywords: the mechanisms through which this impact operates are still partially unclear. Method: In order to explore
safety climate the role that attitudinal ambivalence toward wearing PPE might play in mediating the impact of safety
ambivalence
climate on safety norm violations, a questionnaire was administered to 345 Italian workers. Results: Three
safety norm violations
dimensions of safety climate (i.e., company safety concern, senior managers safety concern, supervisors
work injuries prevention
personal protective equipment
attitudes towards safety) were found to be positively associated with the individual ambivalence level,
whereas the fourth one (i.e., work pressure) was negatively correlated with it. In turn, low levels of
ambivalence were associated with a lower tendency to break the safety norms, even though the perception
of a good safety climate also maintained a direct effect on unsafe behaviors. Impact on industry: Designers of
training program for the prevention of work related injuries must pay great attention to the psycho-social factors
(such as the effects of the safety climate perception by employees on their attitudes and behaviors), and include
specic contents into the prevention programs in order to improve workers compliance with safety norms.
2009 National Safety Council and Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Problem possible. Monodisciplinary clinical and biomedical approaches are

Statistics provided by the International Labour Organization (ILO)
show that, despite scientic and technological progress, working
conditions in the countries of the European Union have not changed
to such a degree as to signicantly reduce the problem of occupational
injuries. While workers pay the highest price of all, there are also
social and economic costs, which average about 3% of the gross
national product of each country in the European Union. Safety
conditions in the workplace vary notably from country to country,
from sector to sector, and from social group to social group (Dembe,
1999). The situation in Italy is just as serious, where about 900,000
injuries and over 1,300 deaths were recorded on average per year
between 1998 and 2005 (data source: Inail). In 2006, the standardized
rate of incidence of fatal work injuries in Italy was 2.9, which is
slightly higher than the European Union (Euro area rate of 2.5; data
source, Eurostat). This is why research in this eld carried out in Italy
is both urgent and of interest. Research on occupational safety has
developed considerably in many disciplines, with the main objective
of eliminating from the workplace as many dangers and risks as
now quite well-developed; however, ndings of technological
research aiming at the design of safe products and processes are
also now available. The joint effects of features of people, tools, tasks,
and operating environments on the likelihood of injury remains a less
well-explored eld in Italy (Dekker, 2002). A deeper knowledge from
this perspective, however, would allow organizations to consciously
address the dangers inherent in the production process by promoting
safety practices and managing potential residual risk (which cannot
be eliminated) by promoting the use of personal protective equipment.
The present study examines the potential mediating effect of
employees attitudinal ambivalence toward safety practices on the
relationship between organizational safety climate and unsafe
behaviors. Thus, unsafe behaviors are seen as a symptom of something
dysfunctional at an organizational level. Greater awareness of how
this relationship works is of particular interest as ndings could
potentially orient interventions (e.g., training programs), which could
result in improved workplace safety.
1.1. Safety Climate

We wish to express our gratitude to Anna Rita Graziani, Franco Fraccaroli, Leopoldo
Magelli, Michele Roccato, and Venere Pavone for comments on earlier drafts of this
manuscript.
Corresponding author. Tel.: +39 0522 523262; fax: +39 0522 523055.
E-mail addresses: nicoletta.cavazza@unimore.it (N. Cavazza), aserpe@unimo.it
(A. Serpe).
1
Tel.: + 39 0522 523262; fax: + 39 0522 523055.
Research on the role of organizational and psychosocial factors in
inuencing risk behaviors and the likelihood of injury at work showed
that safety climate has great impact (Clarke, 2006).
The construct of a safety climate was introduced by Zohar (1980)
and was dened as the employees shared perceptions of safety policies,
procedures, and practices, as well as the overall importance and the true

0022-4375/$ see front matter 2009 National Safety Council and Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.jsr.2009.06.002
278 N. Cavazza, A. Serpe / Journal of Safety Research 40 (2009) 277283
priority of safety at work (Grifn & Neal, 2000; Zohar, 1980, 2000, 2003).
Safety climate is a specic form of organizational atmosphere that taps
into individual perceptions of the importance of safety in the work
environment (Neal, Grifn, & Hart, 2000). It acts as a frame of reference
that orients employee and workgroup practices and a range of work-
related individual attitudes (Morrow & Crum, 1998).
While there is general agreement on the denition of safety
climate, the dimensionality of the construct remains controversial
(Johnson, 2007). Some researchers have argued for a uni-dimensional
latent variable (Neal et al., 2000), while others have claimed that the
safety climate is multi-dimensional (e.g., Cooper & Phillips, 2004;
Dedobbeleer & Beland, 1998; Mohammed, 2002; O'Toole, 2002;
Zohar, 1980; Zohar & Luria, 2005), although they do not agree on the
number of factors that constitute it.
Despite the differences in the number of factors, a recurrent theme
has emerged. Indeed, many dimensions (e.g. perceived management
attitudes and behaviors in relation to safety, management concern for
employees well-being, perceived importance of safety training
programs) concern management commitment to safety (Cohen &
Cleveland, 1983; Flin, Mearns, Fleming, & Gordon, 1996; Huang, Ho,
Smith, & Chen, 2006; Mason & Simpson, 1995; Seo, Torabi, Blair, &
Ellis, 2004). Some studies showed that the dimensions related to
management commitment to safety account for over half of the total
variance in safety climate (Huang et al., 2006; Zohar, 1980). However,
a number of studies have included different or several levels of
management (e.g., senior managers, supervisor).
Cheyne, Cox, Oliver, and Tomas (1998) reported management
commitment as a primary factor in their model of safety behaviors,
and they also incorporated safety communication as one component
of safety climate. Safety communication concerns the perception of
being able and encouraged to discuss safety issues in the organization
and of having access to relevant safety information (Larsson, Pursette,
& Torner, 2008). In fact, a positive safety climate is more likely to exist
in an environment where there is an open and effective exchange of
information (DeJoy, Schaffer, Wilson, Vanderberg, & Butt, 2004).
Other dimensions regarding safety climate are workgroup safety
involvement and the priority of safety issues (Pousette, Larsson, &
Trner, 2008).
Workgroup safety involvement concerns workers perception of
coworkers involvement in and commitment to safety issues: if a
worker perceives that his/her coworkers are concerned about safety,
the group tends to practice safety behaviors (Hayes, Perandan,
Smecko, & Trask, 1998).
The concept of safety climate must also include all those aspects
that refer to how management deals with safety issues in relation to
other company objectives (Cox & Cheyne, 2000; Niskanen, 1994;
Tharaldsen, Olsen, & Rundmo, 2008). Safety issues often compete with
other operational issues such as speed or ow production. Safety
policies and procedures can be inferred from the workers perceptions
about the balance maintained between pressure for production and
safety (Zohar, 2008). Indeed, in a number of surveys, aspects relating
to work pressure are included as part of the broad safety climate (Flin,
Mearns, O'Connor, & Bryden, 2000).
The scarce agreement on the number of dimensions converging in
the construct is also due to the little evidence regarding the validity of
scales that measure the safety climate, given that these scales were
often developed in relation to specic national and industrial contexts
(Seo et al., 2004).
Aside from the dimensions incorporated, the concept of safety
climate is of interest because of its inuence on workers behavior. A
number of studies have shown that safety climate is the main antecedent
of safety performance (participation and compliance to safety rules and
procedures) in organizations (Flin et al., 2000; Grifn & Neal, 2000; Seo,
2005). Indeed, research has revealed growing evidence that perception
of safety climate is associated with an increase in safety practices
(Cheyne et al., 1998; Zohar, 1980), a decrease in unsafe behaviors
(Brown, Willis, & Prussia, 2000; Cabrera & Isla, 1998; DeJoy, Murphy, &
Gershon, 1995; Hofmann & Stetzer, 1996; Tomas, Melia, & Oliver, 1999;
Varonen & Mattila, 2000), and in the number of injuries (Barling,
Loughlin, & Kelloway, 2002; Cohen, 1977; Dedobbeleer & Beland, 1998;
Gillen, Baltz, Gassel, Kirsh, & Vaccaro, 2002; Hofmann & Stetzer, 1996;
Mearns, Flin, Fleming, & Gordon, 1998; Mearns, Flin, Gordon, & Fleming,
2001; Zohar, 2000). The meta-analytic review by Clarke (2006) found
strong support for the link between safety climate and employees safety
performance, and a valid, though weak, correlation between safety
performance and occupational accidents and injuries.
Huang et al. (2006) found that the perception of control completely
mediated the effect of the safety climate on the frequency of occupational
injuries: the safety climate (measured in terms of management
commitment to safety, return to work policies, post injury administra-
tion and safety training) enhanced the workers perception of their
personal ability to avoid injury and accidents and led to a reduction in the
number of self-reported work-related injuries. Recently, a longitudinal
survey by Pousette et al. (2008) found that safety climate signicantly
predicted self-reported safety behaviors seven months later.
Most of the research focusing on the relationship between safety
climate and safety behaviors has shown that the relationship is
mediated by other variables (Cooper & Phillips, 2004). The study of
mediational factors is important because it allows us to understand
the mechanisms through which safety climate operates on those
workers behaviors that reduce risk of injury.
Two of the mediational factors that convey the inuence of safety
climate on the likelihood of using personal protective equipment are:
the knowledge of the safety procedures and practices in the workplace
and the motivation to perform safety-related actions or to participate
in activities supporting safety in the organization (Grifn & Neal,
2000). Other studies showed that workers psychological stress (Siu,
Phillips, & Leung, 2004) and production pressures (Brown et al., 2000)
can play the same role.
Seo (2005) found that perceived safety climate affected safety
performance in three different paths simultaneously: (a) indirect,
through the inuence of perceived work pressure affecting perceived
risk inuencing perceived barriers (i.e., skepticism regarding the
importance and efcacy of safety procedures); (b) through direct
inuence on perceived barriers that affected unsafe practices; and (c)
through direct inuence on unsafe behaviors.
In the present study we focused on six aspects of safety climate
and we explored their role in reducing workers attitudinal ambiva-
lence toward using personal protective equipments (hereinafter PPE),
hypothesizing that the latter has a mediational role between safety
climate and safety behaviors (see below). Dimensions of safety
climate were chosen empirically on the basis of both the importance
attributed to them by researchers as illustrated above and the
relevance to the Italian context. They were: company safety concern
(CSC), senior managers safety concern (SMSC), supervisors attitude
toward safety (SAS), workgroup safety involvement (WSI), work
pressure (WP), safety communication (SC).
1.2. Attitudinal Ambivalence toward Safety Behaviors
In the last decade, many social psychologists involved in the study of
attitude within a social-cognitive approach have increasingly focused
their attention on the feature of ambivalence. They have moved from a
denition of attitudes as a univalent construct (either positive or negative
valenced toward an object) to a denition in which positive and negative
evaluations of a particular object coexist in the same cognitive structure.
Ambivalence may be held toward goals, events, objects, and/or
behaviors. People's reactions to conicting stimuli (e.g., to carry
condoms) drives attitudinal ambivalence, and personal behaviors are
particularly likely to be the object of attitudinal ambivalence because
of the motivational conicts they generate (Conner & Armitage, 2008;
Conner et al., 2002). Among behaviors, self-protecting behaviors are
 N. Cavazza, A. Serpe / Journal of Safety Research 40 (2009) 277283 279

often such conicting stimuli due to the conict between immediate Table 1
costs and future potential benets. In the same way, risky behaviors Research participants for each type of industry.

are conicting stimuli due to the conict between immediate benets Type of Number of Response Mean Number of Mean job
and future potential costs. industry participants rate age women tenure
More generally, many health-related behaviors are likely to be Mechanic 288 94% 37.07 6 5.99
associated with ambivalence, since the promotion of such behaviors Textile 38 91% 41.70 11 10.52
Food 81 87% 41.50 22 11.79
in order to improve health can contrast with the perceived cost of that
Total 345 91% 38.67 39 11.20
behavior or with a positive evaluation of an alternative, health-
threatening, behavior. For example, Conner, Povey, Sparks, James, and
Shepherd (1998) examined 12 health-risk and health-protective
behaviors relevant to students and found that drinking alcohol and the mandatory use of PPE on the job), at least in part, through the
eating a low-fat diet produced the highest degrees of ambivalence. reduction of attitudinal ambivalence toward wearing PPE.
Furthermore, societal norms, social groups, and the attitudes of To test this hypothesis, we compared a full mediation, a partial
signicant others may provide potentially conicting information. mediation, and an independent model.
Thus, attitudinal ambivalence may have interpersonal antecedents Our nal goal was to explore which safety climate dimensions had
such as the perception of normative conict (Priester & Petty, 2001). the heaviest impact on attitudinal ambivalence. As the topic is
But interpersonal and social factors could also reinforce one side of the relatively unexplored, we could not formulate any hypothesis.
conict (e.g., make the individual perceive others expectations for
him/her to behave in a prevention way) and weaken the other, 2. Method
thereby reducing individual ambivalence. This is why we can expect
that a positive safety climate could impact the workers level of 2.1. Data and procedure
ambivalence: Positive safety climate communicates that the benet of
following the safety rules outweighs the costs. The present research is based on a questionnaire administered to
Research has shown that attitudinal ambivalence has some 345 blue-collar workers from three companies located in the north of
important implications for the attitude-behavior relationship. Indeed, Italy, as reported in Table 1. The rst company is a mechanic industry
many studies have revealed a moderation effect of ambivalence, such devoted to the construction and maintenance of networks for electrical
that higher levels of ambivalence are related to lower attitude- energy, water, and gas; the second one is an industry designing and
behavior coherence (Armitage & Conner, 2000; Conner et al., 2002; producing creative knitted fabrics; and the third one is a company of
Jonas, Broemer, & Diehl, 2000). The moderation effects were found beef slaughtering and meat processing.
both for self-reported and observed behavior (Sparks, Harris, & The questionnaire was completed on a voluntary basis during
Lockwood, 2004). Some of the studies showing this effect were work time and with at least one researcher present.
carried out specically on health-related behavior (e.g., Dormandy, Participants were 83.5% (n = 288) male, aged from 17 to 63
Hankins, & Marteau, 2006). (M = 38.67, SD = 9.43), and mean job tenure was 11.20 years
However, as far as we know, there are no published studies (SD = 8.75, range 0-38); 48.7% of the respondents had compulsory
focusing on the role of attitudinal ambivalence in the safety work- education level (i.e., 8 years of schooling).
related domain. The present study examines this issue, which is
important for two reasons. First, it provides insight into how different 2.2. Measures
levels of ambivalence toward self-protecting behaviors (e.g., wearing
PPE) are related with the actual frequency of unsafe behaviors (e.g., 2.2.1. Unsafe behavior
not wearing PPE). Second, it tries to extend our comprehension of the In each of the companies taken into consideration, our respon-
mechanisms through which organizational safety climate inuence dents are obliged by the law to wear some kind of PPE during their
actual worker behavior. main task. Thus, the critical dependent variable employed in this
study was the frequency of violations of formal safety norms
1.3. Overview concerning the use of personal protective equipment (PPE). Indeed,
unsafe behavior is considered a valid proxy for injury and the best
The main goal of our research was to show that attitudinal predictor of accidents/near misses as measured by self-reported data
ambivalence toward safety behaviors is a critical factor worth (Mearns et al., 2001). Moreover, reviews of injury records showed
studying in order to better understand how to reduce injury risks in that the majority of injuries were associated with unsafe acts (Feyer,
the workplace. We intended to rst explore whether in the work Williamson, & Cairns, 1997).
domain, as in other health-related domains, individual ambivalence Among a variety of potential violations, we chose to ask
toward safety behaviors increases the likelihood of performing risky respondents about the frequency of violations in the use of PPE
behaviors. In line with the literature on attitudinal ambivalence, we because, besides the specic practices to prevent production-related
formulated the following hypothesis: risks, wearing some item of PPE is required of workers in every sector.
We included three items focusing on three different PPE in
Hypothesis 1 [H1]. Lower employee ambivalence toward self- accordance with the specic norms regulating safety in each
protective behavior (i.e., to use PPE) will relate with lower frequency company2 (overall Cronbach's Alpha = .66). Participants were
of unsafe behavior (i.e., to work without PPE). requested to indicate the frequency with which they usually do
Our second goal was to determine whether ambivalence could play a not comply with the norms on a 4-point scale ranging from
mediational role between safety climate (including the dimensions of
company safety concern, senior managers safety concern, supervisors
attitude toward safety, workgroup safety involvement, work pressure, 2
The PPE included were following:
safety communication) and risky behaviors.
We formulated the hypothesis as follows: - for the mechanic company: safety glasses, helmet, protective footwear.
- for the textile company:protective footwear, protective gloves, hearing protective
Hypothesis 2 [H2]. Organizational safety climate reduces the devices.
frequency of workers violations of safety rules (i.e., norms regulating - for the food company: thermal protective garment, protective footwear, helmet.
280 N. Cavazza, A. Serpe / Journal of Safety Research 40 (2009) 277283

1 = never to 4 = always. Thus, higher scores indicated more frequent
unsafe behaviors.
2.2.2. Safety climate
In order to measure the workforce's perception of safety climate,
we decided to construct a scale on the basis of the suggestions
advanced by three contributions to the debate regarding how to
measure safety climate (Cheyne et al., 1998; Clarke, 2006; Flin et al.,
2000). Specically, they acknowledge a number of emergent themes
among a wide range of climate features assessed in the studies that
mainly concerned management (seniors, plants, supervisors) invol-
vement toward safety, work pressure, and communication about
safety. Thus, we considered six dimensions, each of which included
three items formulated to adapt to the Italian organizational context.
The rst three dimensions concerned management commitment
to safety, and addressed different levels of management (company as
a whole, senior managers, supervisors); the fourth concerns the co-
workers attitude and expectation toward safety behavior; the fth
regards the perception of work pressure; the sixth dimension refers to
safety communication. Denitions and reliability coefcients are the
following:
Company safety concern (CSC): the extent to which the company
is perceived to prioritize safety goals (example of an item: my com-
pany is concerned about safety-related issues regarding workers)
= .84;
Senior managers safety concern (SMSC): workers perceptions of senior
managers support of safety practices and behavior (example of an item:
senior managers in this company encourage workers to use PPE) =.80;
Supervisors attitudes toward safety (SAS): employees perception of
the importance given to safety by supervisors (example of an item: your
line supervisor believes that workers health is very important) =.68;
Workgroups safety involvement (WSI): the degree of workgroup
joint involvement in safety (example of an item: your workgroup is
concerned about safety) = .34;
Work pressure (WP): the workers impression that the company
emphasizes production goals over safety goals (example of an item:
your line supervisor only wants you to nish your work as quickly as
possible) = .74. This is the only dimension for which a higher score
means a worse safety climate.
Safety Communication (SC): perceptions of being able and encour-
aged to discuss safety issues (example of an item: if I have a problem
concerning safety I can talk about it with the line supervisors) = .53;
Since the Cronbach's Alpha showed the two dimensions Safety
Communication and Workgroups safety involvement as having insufcient
reliability, we decided to drop them out in the subsequent analyses.
2.2.3. Ambivalence
We measured potential ambivalence toward using PPE. Four items
were used to separately assess positive and negative emotions and beliefs
in reaction to the use of each PPE (example concerning protective
footwear: wearing protective footwear makes working more difcult;
wearing protective footwear makes me avoid a possible damage; wearing
protective footwear while I work bothers me; wearing protective
footwear makes me feel safe). Thus, there were a total of 12 items for
individuals to respond to on a 4-point scale ranging from 1=completely
disagree to 4=completely agree. We combined the answers in a global
ambivalence score through the formula suggested by Thompson, Zanna,
and Grifn (1995). This formula produces a score that is a function of the
simultaneous intensity of the positive and negative ratings. Accordingly,
2.3. Data analysis procedure
Descriptive statistics and correlations of the studied variables were
analyzed rst. Structural equation modeling (SEM) techniques were
then used to test and compare the hypothesized mediational models.
Amos 4.0 software was used to perform SEM.
3. Results
3.1. Intercorrelations among the variables
Descriptive statistics and the intercorrelations among the included
variables are displayed in Table 2. We generally found that percep-
tions of company safety concern, senior managers safety concern, and
supervisors attitudes toward safety were positively correlated with
each other, and negatively correlated with work pressure. The rst
three dimensions were positively correlated both with ambivalence
and unsafe behaviors, whereas work pressure was negatively
correlated to them. Thus, when in the direction of a positive safety
climate, the four dimensions were associated with a low level of
individual ambivalence toward the use of PPE, but this was
particularly true for the perceptions of line supervisors positive
attitude toward safety and the perception of the active senior
managers support of safety practices.
As expected (H1), ambivalence was positively correlated with self-
reported frequency of unsafe behaviors.
3.2. Mediating role of attitudinal ambivalence
To study the mediation effect of attitudinal ambivalence toward
PPE, we carried out three competing path analyses through a
structural equation model (see Fig. 1).
Because the two alternative competing models are nested in the
full mediation model, we compared the full mediation model with
each of the two competing models based on the difference between
the two 2 values associated with the models, which is also
distributed as a 2 distribution.
To assess the t, we used a mixture of the recommended t-
indices: The absolute t measures likelihood ratio 2; Root Mean
Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA); the Goodness of Fit Index
(GFI); the Adjusted Goodness of Fit Index (AGFI); the Normed Fit
Index (NFI); and the Relative Fit Index (RFI). GFI and AGFI values of 0.9
or above are taken to indicate a good model t to the sample data
(Kelloway, 1998). Values of NFI and RFI indicate the degree to which
the model ts better than a poorly tting model (Bentler & Bonett,
1980). Values of RMSEA are acceptable if they are equal to or lower
than 0.10 (Steiger, 1990).
The latent construct of safety climate was indicated by the four
dimensions: company safety concern, senior managers safety con-
cern, supervisors attitudes toward safety, and work pressure.
The results showed all three models as having acceptable t (see
Table 3). When comparing models B and C against model A, the 2
Table 2
Descriptive statistics and intercorrelations (N = 345).
M SD 1 2 3 4 5 6

we calculated potential ambivalence toward the use of PPE by averaging 1. unsafe behavior 2.16 1.10 - .23 - .23 - .22 - .20 .12
2. ambivalence 1.35 .90 - - .31 - .34 - .35 .25
the positive and negative attitude scores (both expressed in positive
3. CSC 3.10 .63 - .72 .58 - .39
values) and subtracting the absolute difference between the two 4. SMSC 3.10 .67 - .60 - .40
components from the average of the two components, using the formula 5. SAS 3.31 .76 - - .41
(P+N)/2-|P-N|+0.5, where P is the positive attitude score, and N the 6. WP 2.65 .79 -
negative attitude score. A higher score indicates a greater level of Note: p b .01; p b .05. CSC = Company safety concern; SMSC = senior managers
ambivalence (range 0-3.50). safety concern; SAS = supervisors attitude toward safety; WP = work pressure.
 N. Cavazza, A. Serpe / Journal of Safety Research 40 (2009) 277283 281

4. Discussion

The present results showed that attitudinal ambivalence toward

Fig. 1. Full (A), partial (B), and independent (C) path-analytic models: inuence of
safety climate on unsafe behaviors through attitudinal ambivalence. Legend: CSC =
Company safety concern; SMSC = senior managers safety concern; SAS = supervisors
attitude toward safety; WP = work pressure.
difference test revealed model B as the best representation of the
empirical data of the three. Furthermore, all the standardized
regression weights were signicant and in the predicted direction.
In this model, R2 for the endogenous variables were 0.61 for company
safety concern, 0.73 for senior managers safety concern, 0.51 for
supervisors attitudes toward safety, 0.24 for work pressure, 0.17 for
ambivalence, and 0.11 for unsafe behavior.
Thus, the nal structural model showed safety climate as inuencing
self-reported unsafe behavior. This inuence occurred, in line with H2,
through both direct and indirect pathways (i.e., different mechanisms
were at work). Regarding the indirect pathway, the results showed that
safety climate reduced the frequency of self-reported violations of the
norms regarding the use of PPE through the reduction of the employees
ambivalence toward wearing PPE, while the direct pathway remains
signicant after controlling for ambivalence.
wearing PPE is a critical factor in predicting workers tendency to
transgress the norms regulating PPE use. Indeed, three dimensions
of safety climate (i.e., company safety concern, senior managers
safety concern, and supervisors attitudes toward safety) were found
to be positively associated with the individual ambivalence level,
and the fourth one (i.e., work pressure) was negatively associated
with it. In sum, when workers perceive that an organizational atmo-
sphere supports safety, they express a low level of ambivalence
toward using PPE. This was especially true for the perceptions
relating to the more proximal level of management (since we had
to drop the workgroup involvement measure out because of its
insufcient reliability). In turn, low levels of ambivalence were
associated with a lower tendency to break the safety norms, even
though the perception of a good safety climate also showed a direct
effect on unsafe behaviors.
Three limitations should be noted. First, the research design is
retrospective because we asked about the frequency of violations in
the period prior to administration of the safety climate scale. The use
of cross sectional data leads to the obvious restrictions of allowing no
conclusions concerning causality. Furthermore, since our constructs
share a common method of measurement, the intervention of a
possible confounding inuence on our results due to common method
variancetypically at work in behavioral research vulnerable to social
desirabilitycould not be excluded (Podsakoff, MacKenzie, Lee, &
Podsakoff, 2003). A worthwhile direction for future studies in this
domain would be to design longitudinal research in order to further
support the observed relationships among constructs.
Second, the respondents may not be able to correctly report the
frequency with which they have transgressed the norms regulating the
use of PPE. Although self-reported data are generally considered a
primary source of information in psychology and social sciences
(Schwarz, 1999), here we are dealing with formally sanctioned
behaviors and this may result in their underestimation. Future studies
could employ observed and self-reported measures of violation/
compliance and also different kinds of safety behaviors (e.g., employees
participation in safety activities). The third limitation concerns the
sample construction: generalizability of the present ndings may be
limited because of a lack of probability sampling and the low number of
participants. However, an adequate sample size when using SEM is
considered to be between 25:1 (25 times the number of estimated
parameters) and 10:1, with a minimum of 200 participants (Kline,
1998). Our study, with 345 participants and a maximum of 7
parameters estimated, allowed a ratio of about 50:1.
Notwithstanding these limitations, we believe that the present
research contributes to the organizational safety literature by
providing empirical evidence of a mechanism by which safety climate
can alter attitudinal balance, affecting safety behavior.
5. Impact on industry
A deep knowledge of the processes by which safety climate affects
safety behavior would allow organizations to understand why risky
behaviors are sometimes enacted and would help to target the efforts
of the prevention programs.

Table 3
2 statistics and t indices for the three proposed models.

Model Chi-square Df p-value Chi square difference relative model A Df difference GFI AGFI NFI RFI RMSEA
A full 25.17 9 .003 .98 .94 .96 .93 .072
B partial 11.65 8 .17 13.52 1 .99 .97 .98 .96 .036
C independent 19.44 9 .03 5.73 0 .98 .95 .97 .95 .058
282 N. Cavazza, A. Serpe / Journal of Safety Research 40 (2009) 277283
Faced with the need to convince workers to adopt safe behaviors,
companies often limit themselves to providing their employees with
information regarding current laws governing these behaviors. The
Italian law that regulates those aspects concerning workplace safety
acknowledges the fundamental role of training programs for this
specic domain. However, the law appears to conceive professional
training, rst and foremost, as instruction about how to perform a
task safely. Instead, it is well known that individuals do not act only on
the basis of the information in their possession but above all in
relation to the expectations or implicit norms that govern the specic
social context in which they nd themselves (Fishbein & Ajzen, 1975).
These implicit norms about the relative importance of safety in
respect to other objectives within a company and the obligations that
derive from formal norms may contradict each other, thereby
fostering attitudinal ambivalence in the individual, which weakens
the chances that this individual will adopt safe behaviors. The climate
of safety that one breathes in a company is a concentration of
expectations and possible conicts between implicit and explicit
norms.
Our ndings suggest that great attention must be paid to the effects
of the safety climate on psycho-social factors such as attitudes toward
violating the formal safety norms. Thus, researchers should further
explore the role of attitudinal ambivalence toward a more general class
of unsafe practices and practitioners should include specic contents
focusing on psycho-social factors into the prevention programs in order
to improve workers compliance with safety norms.
References
Armitage, C., & Conner, M. T. (2000). Attitudinal ambivalence: A test of three key
hypotheses. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 26, 14211432.
Barling, J., Loughlin, C., & Kelloway, E. K. (2002). Development and test a model linking
safety- specic transformational leadership and occupational safety. Journal of
Applied Psychology, 87, 488496.
Bentler, P. M., & Bonett, D. G. (1980). Signicance tests and goodness of t in the
analysis of covariace structure. Psychological Bulletin, 88, 588606.
Brown, K. A., Willis, P. G., & Prussia, G. E. (2000). Predicting safe employee behavior in
the steel industry: Development and test of socio-technical model. Journal of
Operations Management, 18, 445465.
Cabrera, D. D., & Isla, R. (1998). The role of safety climate in a safety management
system. In A. Hale & M. Baram (Eds.), Safety Management: The challenge in change.
Oxford: Elsevier.
Cheyne, A., Cox, S., Oliver, A., & Tomas, J. M. (1998). Modelling safety climate in the
prediction of levels of safety activity. Work and Stress, 12, 255271.
Clarke, S. (2006). The Relationship Between Safety Climate and Safety Performance: A
Meta-Analytic Review. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 11, 315327.
Cohen, A. (1977). Factors in successful occupational safety programs. Journal of Safety
Research, 9, 168178.
Cohen, H. H., & Cleveland, R. J. T. (1983). Safety programs practices in recording holding
plats. Professional Safety, 28, 2633.
Conner, M. T., & Armitage, C. J. (2008). Attitudinal ambivalence. In W. Crano & R. Prislin
(Eds.), Attitudes and Persuasion (pp. 261286). New York: Psychology Press.
Conner, M. T., Povey, R., Sparks, P., James, R., & Shepherd, R. (1998). Dietary change and
dietary choice: Contributions from social psychology. In A. Murcott (Ed.), Food
choice: Modern social science denitions and discoveries. London: Longman.
Conner, M. T., Sparks, P., Povey, R., James, R., Shepherd, R., & Armitage, C. J. (2002).
Moderator effects of attitudinal ambivalence on attitude-behaviour relationships.
European Journal of Social Psychology, 32, 705718.
Cooper, M. D., & Phillips, R. A. (2004). Exploratory analysis of the safety climate and
safety Behaviour relationship. Journal of Safety Research, 35, 497512.
Cox, S. J., & Cheyne, A. J. T. (2000). Assessing safety culture in offshore environments.
Safety Science, 34, 111129.
Dedobbeleer, N., & Beland, F. (1998). Is risk perception one of the dimensions of safety
climate? In A. Freyer & A. Williamson (Eds.), Occupational Injury: Risk Prevention
and Intervention (pp. 7381). London: Taylor & Francis.
DeJoy, D. M., Murphy, L. R., & Gershon, R. M. (1995). Safety climate in health care
setting. In A. C. Bittner P.C. Champney (Eds.), Advances in industrial Ergonomics and
Safety. London: Taylor and Francis.
DeJoy, D. M., Schaffer, B. S., Wilson, M. G., Vanderberg, R. J., & Butt, M. M. (2004).
Creating safer workplaces: Assessing the determinants and role of safety climate.
Journal of Safety Research, 35, 8190.
Dekker, S. W. A. (2002). Reconstructing human contributions to accidents: The new
view on error and performance. Journal of Safety Research, 33, 371385.
Dembe, A. (1999). Social inequalities in occupational health and health care for work-
related injuries and illnesses. International Journal of Law and Psychiatry, 22,
567579.
Dormandy, E., Hankins, R., & Marteau, T. M. (2006). Attitudes and uptake of a screening
test: the moderating role of ambivalence. Psychology and Health, 21, 499511.
Feyer, A. M., Williamson, A. M., & Cairns, D. R. (1997). The involvement of human
behaviour in occupational accident: Errors in context. Safety Science, 25, 5565.
Fishbein, M., & Ajzen, I. (1975). Beliefs, attitude, intentions, and behavior. An introduction
to theory and research. Reading, Mass: Addison-Wesley.
Flin, R., Mearns, K., Fleming, M., & Gordon, R. (1996). Risk perception an safety in
offshore workers. Safety Science, 22, 131145.
Flin, R., Mearns, K., O'Connor, R., & Bryden, R. (2000). Measuring safety climate:
Identifying the common features. Safety Science, 34, 177192.
Gillen, M., Baltz, D., Gassel, M., Kirsh, L., & Vaccaro, D. (2002). Perceived safety climate,
job demands, and co-worker support among union and non-union injured
construction workers. Journal of Safety Research, 33, 3351.
Grifn, M. A., & Neal, A. (2000). Perception of safety at work: a framework for linking
safety climate to safety performance, knowledge, and motivation. Journal of
Occupational Health Psychology, 5, 347358.
Hayes, B. E., Perandan, J., Smecko, T., & Trask, J. (1998). Measuring perceptions of
workplace safety: Development and validation of the Work Safety Scale. Journal of
Safety Research, 29, 145161.
Hofmann, D. A., & Stetzer, A. (1996). A cross-level investigation of factors inuencing
unsafe behaviours and accident. Personnel Psychology, 49, 307339.
Huang, Y. H., Ho, M., Smith, G. S., & Chen, P. Y. (2006). Safety climate and self-reported
injury: assessing the mediating role of employee safety control. Accident Analysis
and Prevention, 38, 425433.
Johnson, S. E. (2007). The predictive validity of safety climate. Journal of Safety Research,
38, 511521.
Jonas, K., Broemer, P., & Diehl, M. (2000). Attitudinal ambivalence. European Review of
Social Psychology, 11, 3574.
Kelloway, E. K. (1998). Using LISREL for structure equation modeling. Thousand Oaks:
Sage Publication.
Kline, P. (1998). The new psychometrics: Science, psychology and measurement. Florence:
Taylor & Frances.
Larsson, S., Pursette, A., & Torner, M. (2008). Psychological climate and safety in the
construction industry-mediated inuence on safety behaviour. Safety Sciences, 46,
405412.
Mason, S., & Simpson, G. (1995). Measuring safety attitude to target management action.
Nov: The Safety and Health Practitioner 1720.
Mearns, K., Flin, R., Fleming, M., & Gordon, R. (1998). Measuring safety climate on
offshore installation. Work & Stress, 12, 238254.
Mearns, K., Flin, R., Gordon, R., & Fleming, M. (2001). Human and organizational factors
in offshore safety. Work & Stress, 15, 144160.
Mohammed, S. (2002). Safety climate in construction site environment. Journal of
Construction Engineering and management, 128, 375384.
Morrow, P. C., & Crum, M. R. (1998). The effects of perceived and objective safety risk on
employee outcomes. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 53, 300313.
Neal, A., Grifn, M. A., & Hart, P. M. (2000). The impact of organizational climate on
safety climate and individual behaviour. Safety Science, 34, 99109.
Niskanen, T. (1994). Safety climate in the road administration. Safety Science, 17,
237255.
O'Toole, M. F. (2002). The relationship between employee perception of safety and
organizational culture. Journal of Safety Research, 33, 231243.
Podsakoff, P. M., MacKenzie, S. B., Lee, J., & Podsakoff, N. P. (2003). Common variance
biases in behavioral research: A critical review of the literature and recommended
remedies. Journal of Applied Psychology, 88, 879903.
Pousette, A., Larsson, S., & Trner, M. (2008). Safety climate cross-validation, strength
and prediction of safety behaviour. Safety Science, 46, 398404.
Priester, J., & Petty, R. E. (2001). Extending the bases of subjective attitudinal
ambivalence: Interpersonal and intrapersonal antecedents of evaluative tension.
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 80, 1934.
Schwarz, N. (1999). Self-reported: How the questions shape the answers. American
Psychologist, 54, 93105.
Seo, D. C. (2005). An explicative model of unsafe work behavior. Safety Science, 43,
187211.
Seo, D. C., Torabi, M. R., Blair, E. H., & Ellis, N. T. (2004). A cross-validation of safety
climate scale using conrmatory factor analytic approach. Journal of Safety
Research, 35, 427445.
Siu, O. L., Phillips, D. R., & Leung, T. W. (2004). Safety climate and safety performance
among construction workers in Honk Kong. The role of psychological strains as
mediators. Accident Analysis and Prevention, 36, 359366.
Sparks, P., Harris, P. R., & Lockwood, N. (2004). Predictors and predictive effects of
ambivalence. British Journal of Social Psychology, 43, 371383.
Steiger, J. H. (1990). Structural model evaluation and modication: An interval
estimation approach. Multivariate Behavioral Research, 25, 173180.
Tharaldsen, J. E., Olsen, E., & Rundmo, T. (2008). A longitudinal study of safety climate
on the Norwegian continental shelf. Safety Science, 46, 427436.
Thompson, M. M., Zanna, M. P., & Grifn, D. W. (1995). Let's not be indifferent about
(attitudinal) ambivalence. In R. E. Petty & J.A. Krosnick (Eds.), Attitude strength:
Antecedents and consequences (pp. 361386). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
Tomas, J. M., Melia, J. L., & Oliver, T. (1999). A cross-validation of a structural equation
model of accidents: organizational and psychological variables as predictors of
work safety. Work and Stress, 13, 4958.
Varonen, U., & Mattila, M. (2000). The safety climate and its relationship to safety
practices, safety of the work environment and occupational accidents in eight
wood-processing companies. Accident Analysis and Prevention, 32, 761769.
Zohar, D. (1980). Safety climate in industrial organizations: theoretical and applied
implications. Journal of Applied Psychology, 65, 96102.
 N. Cavazza, A. Serpe / Journal of Safety Research 40 (2009) 277283 283

Zohar, D. (2000). A group-level model of safety climate: testing the effect of group Alessandra Serpe has a degree in Psychology from the University of Bologna (Italy).
climate on micro-accidents in manufacturing jobs. Journal of Applied Psychology, 85, She is now a PhD student at the University of Modena-Reggio Emilia (Italy). Her
587596. dissertation topic is about psycho-social factors explaining risky behaviors in
Zohar, D. (2003). Safety climate: conceptual and measurement issues. In J. Q. Campbell organizations.
& L.E. Tetrick (Eds.), Handbook of occupational health psychology. Washington:
American Psychological Association.
Zohar, D. (2008). Safety climate and beyond: A multi-level multi-climate framework.
Safety Science, 46, 376387.
Zohar, D., & Luria, G. (2005). A multilevel model of safety climate: Cross-level
relationships between organization and group-level climates. Journal of Applied
Psychology, 90, 616628.

Nicoletta Cavazza has a PhD in Social Psychology from the University of Bologna
(Italy). She is now an associate professor at the Universit di Modena e Reggio Emilia,
Italy. She teaches Psychology of attitudes and opinions, Political Psychology and
Interview and questionnaire techniques. Her main research interests are psycho-social
factors explaining risky behaviors in organizations, attitude change, attitude
ambivalence, persuasive communication, political psychology, and social aspects of
eating. She is a counselor for local institutions about the evaluation of the educational
programs aimed at preventing work injuries.