MEDIATING EFFECTS OF WORKERS’ ATTITUDE ON RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN OSHMS AND OSH CULTURE: CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY IN SARAWAK

Abstract

This study aims to examine the mediating effects of workers' attitude on a relationship between OSHMS and OSH culture in the construction industry in Sarawak. The accident in the industry is a major contributor to the accident’s statistics. The Malaysian government is serious in preventing the accidents in the construction industry including in Sarawak. Both authorities such as DOSH and CIDB are responsible to monitor the development of the construction industry including the OSH implementation in the workplace. DOSH is providing a free service to construction player in terms of legislative compliance including the implementation of OSHMS, and CIDB is controlling the industry development by registering all construction workers. CIDB is also providing site safety induction to the construction workers in order to create safety awareness for workers. However, the number of accidents reported is quite alarming. It is believed that the occurrence of an accident is due to the attitude of the workers towards OSHMS. Adopting the positivist approach, five points Likert scale questionnaires have been distributed to five ongoing construction sites in the city of Kuching and two in Bintulu. There were 365 respondents participating in this study. Some scholars agreed that attitude is a predictor to the behaviour of the unsafe act. The findings showed that the mediation effect of workers’ attitude only occurred on the safety training and site safety inspection. It shows that the workers’ attitude towards the implementation of OSHMS in the workplace is poor. Thus, reflects the situation in the industry in Sarawak is actually experiencing poor OSH culture. Poor workers’ attitude was influenced by several factors such as the respondent’s education level, the origin of the respondents, the number of working experiences, the type and frequency of safety training attended by the respondents, and the commitment of the management themselves. This study verifies that one of the factors influence poor OSH culture in the construction industry in Sarawak is due to the poor workers’ attitude toward OSHMS in the workplace.