Safety culture research and practice: A review of 30 years of research collaboration

Abstract

Safety culture is a prevalent construct in industrial safety management and arguably one of the most important developments in industrial safety in recent history. This paper aims to provide insight into how an undefined term coined in 1986 has become a major area of collaborative research. This paper also intends to discuss how the construct of safety culture is a positive example of collaborative research and knowledge translation. A literature search was conducted to identify all peer-reviewed journal articles that included the term “safety culture” in the title in the database. The relevant publications are compared with the use of safety culture by industry and governments to illustrate the intertwined relationship between research and practice. An initial literature search yielded 1,253 article findings. After refining search results, 420 relevant peer-reviewed articles from 1986 until 2016 remained. Safety culture research has been conducted in response to industry interest in the concept. This industry interest has not only resulted in excellent knowledge translation but also may have contributed to the fragmentation of the research area.