Occupational Safety and Health Research (¡Ponte Listo!)

Details

• Personal Author:
  Grzywacz JG
• Description:
  The primary outcome of this award was the generation of new insight into circumstances contributing to poor occupational health outcomes among immigrants. The results of our qualitative research replicate several previous papers and extend those works by indicating that workers' behavior on the job site is both a choice and imposed upon them. Workers choose to don a safety harness or rely on a beverage supporting hydration. However, workers also exist in a context where their "boss" works on thin margins that exaggerate a tendency to focus on working fast rather than safely. Some workers, like immigrants without documentation, have few employment options, so any job is better than no job. Frequently, work crews are also family units where nephews or children are "workers" and "uncles" or "fathers" are employers - blurring familial and workplace roles. The "businesses" are not developed entities with a "business model," a strategic plan, and a team of experts: they are simply a willingness to work hard using the resources I have (a truck, tools, a social network), regardless of the circumstances. Insights from talking with contractors and family members, in addition to workers, enrich the discussion of past descriptions of immigrant Latino construction worker safety-related behavior. A second critical learning is the appropriateness of dominant community-engaged occupational safety and health models. Most models emerge from major academic centers in unique rather than typical contexts. The Harvard Total Worker Health Center, for example, does its fabulous work in a region with a long history of union representation, robust union penetration, and (even without the union) a storied role in the battle for safe workplaces. The California Labor Lab, likewise, does its fabulous work in places like San Francisco's Chinatown, a place with over 200 years of history of immigrant presence (and strife), a state that is "immigrant-friendly," as well as some of the most progressive occupational labor protections in the country. The critical question is, "can models from locations like this inform other communities very different from them?" Our project was situated in a state where "workplace safety" is, at best, a second thought, working with an immigrant community that is less than 30 years old and had a record of strong anti-immigrant legislation (HB 1804). Common rhetoric of community-engaged methods like "build trusting relationships" and "engage community leaders" likely means something different in a 30-year-old than a 150-year-old community. Unlike the community partners of established centers like Harvard and California Labor Lab, our partner was a 501(c)3 born during the pandemic because the planned partner dissolved a few years earlier. The critical learning underlying is that the next generation of community-engaged strategies surrounding occupational health must think more deeply about the models deployed and speak more clearly about the meaning of "building trust" or "identifying leaders." [Description provided by NIOSH]
• Subjects:
  Accidental Falls Community Health Services Construction Industry Emigration And Immigration Occupational Health Safety Staff Development
• Keywords:
  Community Health Construction Workers Fall Protection Immigrant Workers Qualitative Methods R2p Research To Practice Initiative Safety Practices Training
• Series:
  Grant Final Reports
• Publisher:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Document Type:
  Text
• Funding:
  Grant
• Genre:
  Final Grant Report
• Place as Subject:
  Atlanta Region [OSHA] ; Birmingham Region [OSHA] ; Florida
• 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:
  1-14
• NIOSHTIC Number:
  nn:20070869
• 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, R01-OH-012177, 2025 Jan; :1-14
• Email:
  joe.grzywacz@sjsu.edu
• Federal Fiscal Year:
  2025
• NORA Priority Area:
  Construction
• Performing Organization:
  Florida State University
• Peer Reviewed:
  False
• Start Date:
  20200803
• Source Full Name:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• End Date:
  20230731
• Collection(s):
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:37787209ce0550d5720f76d7ae6e0585d4c10e00573e29997e45c1679bb84f1404b13145a002d2080e47a4960102b945b03fd65cfe9c1e4cd770e3dbd5849b09
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/219291/cdc_219291_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 1.19 MB ]