Occupational Health Literacy, Socioeconomic Status & Work-Related Injury to Teens

Details

• Personal Author:
  Myers D ; Rauscher, Kimberly
• Description:
  Building on the concept of "health literacy" as defined by the US Department of Health and Human Services, we developed an analogous measure specific to workplace safety, "occupational health literacy" (OHL). OHL, as we have defined it, is "the degree to which individuals have the capacity to obtain, process, and understand basic occupational safety and health (OSH) information and services (i.e., safety training) needed to be safe at work." As general health literacy is important to good health and safety training can be protective against work injury, particularly among young and inexperienced workers, we suggest that OHL, which embodies much more than the acquisition of safety training, can affect one's capacity to stay safe at work. In this exploratory study, we achieved the following three objectives: 1) to assess adolescent OHL; 2) to determine whether OHL is associated with adolescent work-related injury (WRI) risk and 3) to examine whether OHL is associated with adolescents' socioeconomic status (SES). We achieved these objectives using a unique dataset containing survey information on 2,262 adolescent workers in five cities across the US (Oakland, CA; Los Angeles, CA; Brockton, MA; and Philadelphia, PA). These data included variables on work injury, SES, and an array of variables used to measure OHL and is components (e.g., "access to OSH information and training" and "OSH knowledge and awareness"). Descriptive analyses were conducted along with regression modeling. The high prevalence of WRI in this sample precluded the use of logistic regression, thus, to test the association between OHL and injury, Cox regression models were used to obtain prevalence ratios. Findings revealed that adolescents possess a moderate level of OHL with a mean overall OHL score of 14.5 (S.D.=3.1). Among the OHL sub-components, the mean score for the level of OSH information and training was low at 2.8 (S.D.=1.9) while the score for OSH knowledge and awareness was moderate at 11.5 (S.D.=2.2). We also found that OHL is positively associated with WRI prevalence. This association appears to be largely driven by the OHL subscale on receipt of safety training, which likely represents job hazardousness and may be overwhelming any protective effect of OHL on work injury in these analyses. Lastly, adjusted results showed no association between SES (measured as subjects' mother's education) and OHL nor between SES and any of the OHL components. However, teens who work to financially support their family (and are of lower SES) had statistically higher overall OHL scores and scores on the information and training subscales. Despite the negative findings of this exploratory study, we believe there remains a theoretical basis for the concept of "occupational health literacy" and for its potential to protect young workers from injury. We believe that the mainly null findings are more likely due to the limitations of this dataset and the difficulties in examining the potential value of OHL for protecting adolescent workers from work injury than a truly absent association between OHL and WRI among youth. This work has shown that more precise measurement of OHL and variables that may potentially confound its relationship to work injury is crucial to understanding the relationship between OHL and work injury. Much work needs to be done to fully understand the complexities of the OHL concept and how it operates as a potential protective factor for young worker injury. [Description provided by NIOSH]
• Subjects:
  Adolescent Occupational Health Risk Assessment Risk Factors Safety
• Keywords:
  Adolescents Injuries Injury Prevention Occupational Health Programs Occupational Safety Risk Factors Young Workers
• Series:
  Grant Final Reports
• Publisher:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Document Type:
  Text
• Funding:
  Grant
• Genre:
  Final Grant Report
• Place as Subject:
  OSHA Region 3 ; West Virginia
• CIO:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
• Division:
  OEP - Office of Extramural Programs
• Topic:
  Workplace Safety & Health
• Location:
  North America
• Pages in Document:
  1-26
• NIOSHTIC Number:
  nn:20059241
• NTIS Accession Number:
  PB2021-100116
• Citation:
  Atlanta, GA: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Public Health Service, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, R03-OH-009557, 2012 Nov; :1-26
• Contact Point Address:
  Kimberly Rauscher, WVU Injury Control Research Center, P.O. Box 9151, Morgantown, WV 26506
• Email:
  krauscher@hsc.wvu.edu
• Federal Fiscal Year:
  2013
• NORA Priority Area:
  Services ; Wholesale and Retail Trade
• Performing Organization:
  West Virginia University
• Peer Reviewed:
  False
• Start Date:
  20090901
• Source Full Name:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• End Date:
  20120831
• Collection(s):
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:657359b79ee7abf7b4738ff0ca40452b25fdfa84921410078d1125250624b071929d0c7c36a4ac46b1099aed5f92550aff59fb7b2c454b2a02b671052eadde5e
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/218972/cdc_218972_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 263.81 KB ]