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An evaluation of three corporate strategies for safety belt use promotion
Ax,d. Pinted
Ann/. & Pro.
Vol
18, No. 3. pp. 243-251.
1986
KIOl-L575/86 0 1986 Pergamon
in Great Britain.
$3.00+ .oO Journals Ltd.
AN EVALUATION OF THREE CORPORATE STRATEGIES FOR SAFETY BELT USE PROMOTION JOHN G. COPE and WILLIAM F. GROSSNICKLE East Carolina University, Greenville, NC 24601, U.S.A.
and
Virginia Polytechnic
E. SCOTT GELLER Institute and State University, Blacksburg,
VA 24601, U.S.A.
(Received 22 April 1985; in revised form 2 November 1985)
Abstract-Different types of awareness sessions to promote employee safety belt use were evaluated. Across eight different employee safety meetings three dichotomous variables were manipulated: the type of presentation format (lecture vs discussion), the presence or absence of safety belt pledge cards, and the presence or absence of an incentive component. All groups showed a four-fold increase in safety belt use. Five months after the interventions, belt use was still significantly higher than baseline levels. Generalization across employees was demonstrated by a significant increase in safety belt use for those who did not attend the awareness session. The awareness session with a discussion format influenced greater increases in safety belt use than did the lecture-based sessions, but pledge cards and incentives did not increase the impact of these awareness sessions.
A prime goal of American industry is to increase on-the-job safety. it is estimated that each worker fatality can cost corporations as much as $120,000 in direct payments to the beneficiaries, a price that does not include the costs associated with hiring and retraining to fill a vacant position [Pabon, Sims, Smith and Assoc., 19831. Although within-plant accident prevention continues to receive a large amount of research effort, industry has just begun to examine the problems related to accident prevention beyond company boundaries. For example, the corporate safety director for Ford Motor Company declared that for every company employee killed in a plant accident, 14 die in automobile accidents [Gast, 19841. However, the probability of death or serious injury in an automobile accident is reduced by 50% or more if vehicle occupants are wearing their safety belts [Highway Safety Research Center, 19761. Over the past six years, intervention to motivate safety belt usage has been studied in both community and industrial settings [see review by Geller, 19841. This research has produced a \,ariety of intervention approaches, the most effective involving the application of extrinsic rewards contingent on the wearing of vehicle safety belts. Different types of incentives have been used, including dinners, trinkets and small gifts [e.g. Geller, 1983; Geller, Davis and Spicer, 1983; Geller, Johnson and Pelton, 1982; Johnson and Geller, 1984; Spoonhour, 19811, 2s well as cash prizes [e.g. Geller and Hahn, 19841. Although these techniques have proved successful on a short-term basis, with levels of belt wearing reaching as high as 90% [e.g. Spoonhour, 19811, one-shot incentive programs (without intermittent booster sessions) have, for the most part, not produced large, long-term increases in belt wearing [cf. Status Report, 19821.
Attempts have been made to develop alternative strategies that can be combined with incentive strategies to produce longer-term gains in safety belt use. The most recent of these has involved the use of personal commitment tactics [e.g. Geller and Bigelow, 1984; Geller, Rudd and Talton, 1985; Nimmer and Geller, 19851. More specifically, corporate and hospital t mployees and church congregations have been asked to sign a pledge card that obligates them to wear their safety belts for a specified period of time. One such program at the General Motors “ethnical Center, using a combination of pledge cards, incentives and public feedback, increased the level of safety belt use to 70% and maintained a rate of 60% over a two-year follow-up period [Home and Terry, 1983; Home, T. D., personal communication with third author, November 19841. Another strategy that has been examined uses a special educational format to influence 243
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people to buckle their safety belts. For example, Geller and Hahn [ 19841 evaluated the behavioral impact of combining incentives with a special type of group discussion which they called an awareness session. First a 3-min film was shown to get the employees’ attention, and then Professor Geller led a 20-min, informal discussion of the advantages and disadvantages of buckling up. This sort of awareness session was shown to triple belt wearing by blue-collar workers, and later doubled the impact of an effective incentive program [Geller and Hahn, 19841. Given the prior evaluations of corporate-based tactics that were successful at increasing safety belt use, the present study was designed to examine the following: 1) the impact of safety belt awareness sessions incorporated into the occupational safety program of a large company, and 2) the comparative effectiveness of two types of presentation formats (traditional lecture vs employee discussion), the presence or absence of an opportunity to make a personal pledge to buckle up, and the presence or absence of a chance to participate in a safety belt incentive lottery campaign. A secondary goal was to examine the effects of these program components on maintaining the use of safety belts over a relatively long follow-up period.
METHOD
Subjects and Setting The research was conducted at a large North Carolina pharmaceutical plant located in an industrial park near the city of Greenville, North Carolina. The plant (Burroughs Wellcome Co.) was located on a 568-acre site surrounded by a security perimeter with two controlled points of access feeding into parking lots located on the east and west sides of the site. The organization employs a total of 1400 employees, about half of which are white-collar workers (e.g. managers, technicians and clerical employees), and half who are blue-collar workers who provide compounding, manufacturing and other drug production operations. Although the plant operates on two work shifts, all observations were made on “first shift” employees (about 90% of the Burroughs Wellcome staff) as they entered the parking lot in the morning (between 7:00 and 7:30 AM) and as they left work in the afternoon (between 4:00 and 4:30 PM). Data Collection Safety belt use data were obtained five days a week (i.e. Monday through Friday) from October 24, 1983, until April 20, 1984, and from September 4, 1984, through September 24, 1984, yielding a total of 115 observation days. At each of the gate locations, two data collectors were stationed so that they were out of direct traffic, yet still able to see adequately into the passing cars. Since traffic flow was at a higher rate than one car per second during the times of collection, data were not obtained for every passing automobile. Cars were targeted for data collection on a random “whenever ready” basis. After both collectors were finished recording data on the present target, the next available car was selected for the next set of observations. Each of the data collectors was responsible for obtaining from each vehicle: the vehicle license plate number, driver gender, the availability of a shoulder belt for the driver and driver shoulder-belt use. There was no attempt to record the use of lap belts; thus, vehicles without a shoulder belt available for the driver were excluded. For all of this information (except plate numbers), data were obtained independently by each observer in order to assess reliability. Both observers verified each license plate recording by coming to a consensus on the number before the car was out of sight. Experimental Phases The research period can be divided roughly into five experimental phases, termed: 1) Baseline; 2) Plant Announcement; 3) Awareness Sessions; 4) Post-Awareness Sessions and 5) Delayed Follow-Up. Following six weeks of Baseline data collection and prior to the awareness sessions, the employees were informed of the purpose of the project by a series of plant announcements placed on all major bulletin boards (at the cafeteria entrance/exit and at other strategic plant locations). All announcements remained in place until the end of the PostAwareness phase. Each announcement stated that the purpose of the project (and the reason for
Promoting
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the observers at the plant gates) was to study traffic safety issues in general and to examine safety belt wearing in particular. The third phase started with the presentation of the first awareness session. In lieu of the mquired monthly plant safety meetings for all employees, 489 individuals were selected by management to participate in an awareness session related to safety belt wearing. Participants were selected primarily from two major departments within the plant: Production (Sterile Products and Packaging) and Engineering (Maintenance and Security). As was the practice for all safety meetings, group membership was determined by who could be spared from their jobs at the time of the scheduled meeting. The general practice was to encourage as many as possible to go to the meetings, yet no attempts were made to organize the sessions by occupational rank or by work area. Although none of the sessions contained employees solely from one type of job or from one particular organizational rank, most of the participants represented what can best be described as blue-collar workers in that supervisors, professional and clerical employees f -om these areas had already attended safety meetings earlier in the year. The type of awareness s:ssion presented on any particular day was determined randomly. Each of the eight awareness sessions lasted approximately 45 min and consisted of a short 3-min video tape showing tests with dummies undergoing crashes with and without the use of safety belts, followed by a lecture or discussion session. At each meeting two research assistants greeted the participants and took a roll of names. The names for each group were given to the F’ersonnel Department so that license numbers for the participants could be provided. (The Personnel Department keeps detailed records of all vehicles registered at the plant, in keeping with strict security measures common to most pharmaceutical plants. Thus, up-to-date records cf employee license plate numbers were available for all company personnel.) Subsequently, safety belt use per awareness group was categorized through the use of vehicle license numbers. The eight awareness sessions were conducted by a fixed team (i.e. the same members each t me) of four research assistants, each of whom had different responsibilities during the meetings. E;ach sessions was conducted by two of the assistants, while the other two assistants observed and recorded the procedures on audiotape and generally assisted the speakers throughout the session (e.g. helped with the audiovisual equipment in the lecture groups and participated in t le group discussions). The same two team members presented the material for the lecture groups, whereas the two other assistants presented the same information via group discussion. At the start of each session the plant’s Director of Safety introduced the four research assistants. Each lecture or discussion session was set up around the same key information. In order te:, provide consistency and accuracy of the presentations, one of the two observers closely rlonitored the proceedings and checked off the facts as they were presented. If any items were c mitted, one of the observers would bring up the point during prearranged pauses built into both F’resentation formats. Following the completion of the awareness sessions, data collection continued until April ‘20, 1984, without further experimental intervention. Five months after the completion of this Post-Awareness phase, data collection activities were restarted at the plant for an additional tlree weeks (i.e. the final Delayed Follow-Up phase). Intervention Strategies
During the Awareness Session phase, groups of employees were assigned by the Plant Safety Office to each of eight different awareness sessions. The awareness sessions were set up according to a 2 X 2 X 2 factorial design manipulating two levels of discussion groups (i.e. lecture vs discussion), two pledge card conditions (i.e. pledge card vs no pledge card), and two incentive conditions (i.e. a license plate lottery vs no lottery). A description of each condition follows. Lecture vs Discussion. Half of the groups (i.e. four) received a formal lecture and half an informal discussion style of presentation. In the lecture groups the speakers used a traditional l~ture format to present national statistics and facts concerning the value of safety belt usage 2nd possible consequences for nonuse. Each of two speakers presented roughly half of the material. Questions from the audience were not encouraged. In the discussion groups employees were also presented with facts concerning safety belt usage by two of the research assistants (again, each presented roughly half of the material).
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However, the discussion groups differed from the lecture groups in that the participants were encouraged to ask questions throughout the 45-min session. Indeed, the speakers went out into the audience and solicited testimonials, arguments and queries. Pledge vs No Pledge. At half of the sessions, pledge cards were distributed which requested the employee to “Be Assertive About Driver Safety and Take the Seat Belt Safety Pledge.” The employees were urged to sign the pledge cards which committed them to buckle up for two months. All pledge cards (signed and unsigned) were returned to the research assistants prior to leaving the awareness session. Incentives vs No Incentives. All employees in four of the eight groups were given a flyer at the end of the awareness session which discussed an incentive/lottery program. The flyer explained that every time an employee was seen buckled up when entering or leaving the plant, the vehicle license plate number would be entered in a weekly lottery. For each of the four incentive groups, a windbreaker jacket (valued at $50) was provided to the lottery winners at the end of the first and second weeks following the awareness session. Each of the four incentive groups was color coded (i.e. blue, gray, red and yellow) so that winning license numbers could be posted with clear group identification. On the last day of the two incentive weeks, posters were displayed in locations close to the work areas of the employees in the incentive groups. These posters displayed each winning license plate number along with the color code for the relevant group. Winners were instructed to go to the Plant Safety Office to claim their prizes. Before a prize was provided all winning license plate numbers were verified by the Director of Plant Safety from plant personnel records. Weekly group winners were selected randomly by having the computer sort the license numbers of daily belt users into the four separate incentive groups. The winning license number per group was then selected by a random drawing.
RESULTS
Interobserver Reliability Two data collectors obtained independent data entries for 16,097 of the total 22,005 observations, 73.2% of the total sample. An index of interobserver agreement was obtained on all observations of shoulder belt wearing and shoulder belt availability for the driver. Observer reliabilities were calculated by dividing the number of times that the two observers agreed on a particular response category by the total number of paired observations taken of the response, and then multiplying the quotient by 100 to convert to agreement percentages. The following reliability percentages were obtained: 1) 94.0% agreement for driver usage of shoulder belts; 2) 97.2% agreement for shoulder belt available but not worn; and 3) 78.4% agreement for shoulder belt unavailable. Awareness vs No Awareness A total of 2894 safety belt observations was obtained on the 489 individuals who took part in an awareness session, and 11,406 observations were taken for the remaining 9 11 employees who did not attend an awareness session. For purposes of analysis, daily percentages of driver shoulder belt use were collapsed into weekly averages (as shown in Fig. 1). Each data point represents the mean shoulder belt use across five consecutive days of observation. Through the use of a two-way ANOVA the data were analyzed according to a 2(Awareness Session: attending vs not attending an awareness session) x S(Experimenta1 Group: baseline, plant announcements, awareness sessions, post-awareness sessions, and delayed follow-up) experimental design. The main effect for Awareness Session, which was found to be significant, F( 1,200) = 6.11, p < .05, indicated that employees in the awareness session groups showed higher levels of shoulder belt use, M = 25.77%, than did their no awareness session counterparts, M = 2 1.05%. The main effect for Experimental Phase was also found to be significant, F(4,200) = 56.65, p < .OOl. A post hoc Scheffe’ test across the five phases showed that employees who attended an awareness session increased belt wearing significantly (p < ,001) during the Post-Awareness Session Phase (M = 44.4%) from Baseline (M = 11.3%), and remained at a significantly
Promoting
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safety belt use
60 0 Awareness
sessions
0 No awareness
Awareness Sessions End
sessions
Plant Announcement
Awareness Sessions Begin
-
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
Consecutive Fig. 1. Mean weekly shoulder
6
g
10
11
12
Observation
13 14
15 16
17
16
39
40 41
Weeks
belt use across experimental phases for those attending awareness session.
and not attending
an
elevated level (p < .OOl) five months later during Delayed Follow-Up (M = 26.6%). Further, employees who did not attend an awareness session showed a similar trend. A post-hoc Scheffe’ tl:st again revealed a significant increase (p < .OOl) during the Post-Awareness (M = 31.0%) and Delayed Follow-Up (M = 29.5%) periods when compared to Baseline (M = 11.0%). Therefore, the subjects who were not directly exposed to any of the awareness sessions also i lcreased their shoulder belt use, albeit to a lesser extent than those who attended the awareness sessions. In other words, increasing the awareness of a particular group of employees about the value of safety belts seemed to carry over to the rest of the plant employees who did not participate in the training, indicating generalization of the intervention impact. This point was further supported by the fact that the interaction effect also proved to be significant, F(4,200) = 4.02, p < .Ol. A significantly differential rate of shoulder belt use between those who did and did not attend an awareness session occurred only after all the awareness sessions were completed (i.e. during the Post-Awareness Phase), F(166) = 24.4, vs “non-awareness” employees was not I;# < ,001. That is, shoulder belt use for “awareness” found to be significantly different at any other phase except Post-Awareness. Ijipe of Awareness Session The percentage of shoulder belt usage was calculated for each of the eight sessions, yielding sn average for each type of session. Table 1 shows the percentage of belt wearing across experimental phase as a function of each component of the awareness sessions. The data demonstrate generally higher levels of belt wearing across the different phases through Post-Awareness. The highest Post-Awareness levels of wearing were actually obtained by those groups in the No Pledge Card (M = 58.3%) and the No Incentive (M = 57.5%) conditions; and the IDwest levels of wearing were obtained by those groups in the Pledge Card (M = 28.2%) and the Incentive (M = 29.0) conditions. The same pattern was repeated five months later, during the Delayed Follow-Up phase, where again the employees in the No Pledge Card (M = 49.9%) 2nd the No Incentive conditions (M = 45.2%) maintained the highest level of belt wearing. Since all the groups gained in comparison to baseline levels, an examination of the relationship between groups might best be shown by examining the difference between Baseline
11.1 14.3 19.9 43.9 27.7
%
896 279 458 822 439
N
Total Awareness Groun
11.4 14.2 14.9 32.4 30.5
%
4.4 6.6 11.8 28.2 22.6
8
N 431 158 230 377 164
Pledge Card
per condition
2267 625 981 1774 2882
N
Total No Awareness Group
20.3 29.1 31.8 58.3 49.9
%
N
465 121 228 445 275
No Pledge
13.0 16.6 22.4 42.7 31.9
%
325 106 179 340 179
N
Lecture
Il.6 19.1 21.2 43.8 40.6
9% 571 173 279 482 260
N
Discussion
6.1 2.9 9.2 29.0 27.3
%
344 103 185 375 176
N
Incentive
Mean percent wearing shoulder belts as a function of separate awareness session components
Note. N = total number of observations
Baseline Announcement Awareness Post Awareness Delayed Follow-Up
Phase
Table I
18.5 32.8 34.4 57.5 45.2
9%
552 176 273 447 263
N
No Incentive
Promoting T,Ible 2. Difference -
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in mean percent wearing safety belts as a function of separate components
h, ean Difference in Safety Belt Use Between Baseline and Post Awareness Phases Between Baseline and Delayed Follow-Up Phases
of the awareness
sessions
Total Awareness
Total No Awareness
Pledge Card
No Pledge Card
Lecture
Discussion
Incentive
No Incentive
32.8
21.0
23.8
38.0
29.-l
32.2
22.9
39.0
16.6
19.1
18.2
29.6
18.9
29.0
21.2
26.1
2nd each of the later phases of interest. Hence, the percentage of employees wearing safety belts during Baseline for each awareness session component was subtracted from that obtained cluring the Post-Awareness and Delayed Follow-Up phases. These difference scores are presented in Table 2. As shown for the absolute comparisons, the largest gains against Baseline were made by those groups getting No Pledge Cards, No Incentive and a Discussion Group format. In summary, all of the awareness sessions were successful in raising the level of safety belt wearing during the period following their completion and in maintaining an increased level of belt use over a five-month period. Pledge cards were not, however, found to yield higher levels of belt wearing than that found in groups not receiving this commitment intervention. Furthermore, the use of an incentive strategy was not successful in producing higher rates of shoulder belt wearing compared to the no-incentive conditions. DISCUSSION
Baseline levels of safety belt use at a large pharmaceutical plant were not greatly different from the national average of just over 12% reported in the National Register [ 1983, October]. However, by the end of the study, belt wearing had been increased to over 44% or to almost four times the original baseline levels. Indeed, the study demonstrated that even five months later, the rate of usage was still almost twice that of baseline. This maintenance finding is particularly noteworthy because the only other evaluation of similar awareness sessions continued post-awareness follow-up for only three weeks [Geller and Hahn, 19841. Hence, the present ! tudy demonstrated for the first time that certain types of awareness sessions can be effective in motivating increases in safety belt use over relatively long time periods. It was particularly noteworthy that many employees not exposed to an awareness session of any kind were also found to show substantial increases in belt wearing compared to baseline usage levels. These findings are indicative of intervention generalization across employees. In other words, employees not participating in the awareness sessions showed some carry-over effects from those who attended a session. Indeed, this is a reasonable outcome, since the c:mployees who attended the awareness sessions were often arbitrarily selected from areas in c,lose proximity to work units containing employees who were not selected to attend an awareness $,ession. Given the informal group network that exists in most industrial settings, it is difficult to control for employee inter-group communication, which was quite likely in the present study. It is probable that many who participated in an awareness session returned to their respective work or break areas with reports of the session events. Once word of the study was circulated, the data collectors at the gate probably served as daily reminders to all employees throughout the plant that a special safety belt project was under way. Thus, even the non-treated employees may have been prompted to wear their safety belts through peer interaction and daily reminders. These findings are important to future industrial r,pplications in that they suggest that the impact of a safety belt awareness campaign for a select group of employees can snowball across large numbers of plant personnel. However, where communication between the “awareness’ and “no awareness session” groups can be seen as a benefit to the plant as a whole, communication between members of the different individual treatment groups could have masked inter-group differences and thus confounded the effect of the various intervention strategies. Yet it is reasonable to assume that the effects of this communication between treatment groups would be consistent across all of the groups. There was no evidence that any one group was more or less likely to have access
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J. G. COPE et al.
to the others as all of the groups came from the same general physical areas within the plant. Since it is usually unrealistic to expect to totally isolate groups of employees in an industrial setting, it may be more realistic and utilitarian to strive for externally valid results in a naturalistic setting than to rigidly guard against problems of internal validity. The outcome from comparing the effectiveness of the various types of awareness sessions was unexpected and somewhat disappointing. Groups receiving no incentives and no opportunity to make a safety belt pledge actually showed greater increases in shoulder belt wearing than did their counterparts who received opportunities to win incentive prizes and/or signed commitment pledge cards. Geller [1984] has reviewed an extensive literature concerning successful applications of incentive-type strategies to influence safety belt use. Results across the various corporate-based studies showed that most gains from baseline to intervention periods exceeded lOO%, indicating that incentives work remarkably well to motivate safety belt use in industrial settings. One possible explanation for the failure of the incentive scheme in the present study to motivate increased safety belt use was that the type of reward (i.e. a Burroughs Wellcome jacket) may not have been appropriate for this particular sample of employees. Comments were heard throughout the plant such as “who needs another jacket?“. Also, the original jacket selected for the project was later replaced by the Plant Safety Office with a cheaper and more commonly available jacket sold throughout the company. Past safety belt research (as reviewed by Geller, 1984) has indicated that a variety of different rewards have been used successfully, ranging from small trinkets and candy up to a $12,000 automobile. What seems to be important is finding a reward that is salient for a particular audience or population. Yet, the problem is not as easy to solve as simply increasing the number or value of the rewards. There is ample evidence in the social psychological literature to suggest that the value of a reward should not exceed that which is necessary to initiate the target behavior [Deci, 1975; Festinger, 1957 and 19641. Rewards should not be so large that they become the only factor influencing safety belt wearing, because upon their removal there is no internal justification or personal rationale to sustain behavior. Since personal commitment strategies have recently been applied successfully in church and corporate settings [Geller and Bigelow, 1984; Geller, Rudd and Talton, 19851, it was surprising to find that the pledge card strategies did not increase the behavioral impact of the awareness sessions. One possibility for the Pledge Card groups actually showing less increase in safety belt wearing than their No Pledge Card counterparts is that the pledge card procedure may not have been taken seriously. Across the four pledge card groups, the percentage of individuals who actually signed the cards was low. Only 22% of the employees in the Group Discussion with Incentives and Lecture with Incentives groups signed a card. In the group getting a discussion format with no incentive, 35% signed a card. Of those getting a lecture format with no incentive, 43% signed and returned the card. Signing a card pledging to wear a safety belt for a short period of time (i.e. only two months) may not have held a great deal of significance for employees, since the card was presented by and returned to non-employees of the organization. It is possible that a pledge card system which is given more significance by carrying strong company endorsement may prove to be more effective. Perhaps making a personal pledge should be the focal point of an awareness session, and a great deal of emphasis placed on fostering the importance of the commitment decision (both from the format of the awareness session and the organizational milieu). Another related point concerns the ability of the session leaders to generate the type of climate necessary for making a public pledge. In earlier more successful studies of personal commitment strategies (e.g. Geller and Bigelow, 1984; Geller, Rudd and Talton, 1985), the group leader was a very dynamic and enthusiastic speaker with a long history of public presentations. It is possible that the research assistants used in the present study were unable to generate the type of climate necessary to promote a public pledge. Yet, the fact that more of the employees who received the lecture format signed pledge cards than did their counterparts who got a more dynamic discussion style of presentation, does not lend support to this contention. CONCLUSIONS
In summary, the present study demonstrated that an awareness session approach can be readily worked into the ongoing day-to-day operations of a large industry and can have a
Promoting
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substantial effect on the use of safety belts by plant personnel. Of particular interest were the findings that plant-wide increases in belt wearing were observed with only a fraction of the employees (i.e. 35%) receiving a direct awareness/education intervention, and incentives and personal commitment strategies may not be essential ingredients for substantial behavior change. What does appear to be important is the adoption of an interactive style of discussion that engages employee questions in an informal manner. The significance of this finding lies in the realization t?at it did not require professional consultants to provide this type of promotional campaign. The fact that many companies already use discussion-type employee groups in the course of t-aining makes the use of awareness sessions particularly feasible for industrial applications. It should be noted that the speakers in the present study were students, not professional safety experts, several of whom were speaking for the first time in public. Thus, almost anyone, armed with a suitable set of facts, could easily replicate the awareness session process of this study. Acknowledgments-This research was partially supported by U.S. Department of Transportation Contract DTR57683C -0050 awarded to the third author. The authors are grateful for helpful suggestions from Ralph Dudley of Burroughs V’Jellcome Co. and for the special research assistance of Richard Duke, Margo Green, June Gunter, Sheryl Moy, Lori Pate, Sherri Peterson and Gretchen Smith.
REFERENCES Lleci E. L., intrinsic motivation. Plenum, New York, 1975. Festinger L., A theory afcognirive dissonance. Stanford University Press, Stanford, CA, 1957. Festinger L., Conflict, decision and dissonance. Stanford University Press, Stanford, CA, 1964. Cast D., Tech teacher uses psychology in urging people to buckle up. Richmond Times-Dispatch, pp. 1, 9, December 1984. C eller E. S., Rewarding safety belt use at an industrial setting: Tests of treatment generality and response maintenance. J. Appl. Beh. Anal. 16, 43-56, 1983. Geller E. S., Motivating safety belt use with incentives: A critical review of the past and a look to the future. SAE Technical Paper Series (No. 840326). Society of Automotive Engineers, Warrendale, PA, 1984. Geller E. S. and Bigelow B. E., Development of corporate incentive programs for motivating safety belt use: A review. Traffic Safety Eval. Res. Rev. 3 (5), 1984. Geller E. S. and Hahn H. A., Promoting safety belt use at industrial sites: An effective program for blue collar employees. J. Professional Psych.: Res. and Pracr. 15, 553-564, 1984. Geller E. S., Davis L. and Spicer K., Industry-based incentives for promoting seat belt usage: Differential impact on white collar vs. blue collar employees. J. Organizational Beh. Management 5, 17-29, 1983. Geller E. S., Johnson R. P. and Pelton S. L., Community-based interventions for encouraging safety belt use. Amer. J. Community Psych. 10,183-195, 1982. Geller E. S., Rudd J. R. and Talton A., Increasing safety belt use at corporate and church settings: The role of pledgecard commitment. Manuscript in preparation, 1985. Highway Safety Research Center Belts-Questions and answers. Highway Safety Highlighfs 10, 1, December 1976. Home T. D., Workshop presentation at the Michigan Life Savers Conference, Boyne Mountain, Michigan, November 1984. Home T. D. and Terry T., Seat belt sweepstakes-An incentive program. SAE Technical Paper Series (No. 8f3047), Society of Automotive Engineers, Inc., Warrendale, PA, 1983. Jc hnson R. P. and Geiler E. S., Contingent versus noncontingent rewards for promoting seat belt usage. J. Community Psych. 12, 113-122, 1984. N mmer J. G. and Geller E. S., A hospital based safety belt program: Awareness sessions, pledge cards, and incentives. Manuscript in preparation, 1985. Pi bon, Sims, Smith and Assoc., Inc., Motivation of employers to encourage their employees to use safety belts: Phase II. Final report for Contract DTNH 22-80-C 07439 from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. U.S. Department of Transportation, Washington, D.C., 1983. Slroonhour K. A., Company snap-it-up campaign achieves 90 percent belt use. Traflc Safely, pp. 18-19, 31-32. 1981. Rl:wards raise belt use: Fall-off seen later. Status Report, pp. 1-2. Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, Washington, D.C., February 17, 1982.
Ann/. & Pro.
Vol
18, No. 3. pp. 243-251.
1986
KIOl-L575/86 0 1986 Pergamon
in Great Britain.
$3.00+ .oO Journals Ltd.
AN EVALUATION OF THREE CORPORATE STRATEGIES FOR SAFETY BELT USE PROMOTION JOHN G. COPE and WILLIAM F. GROSSNICKLE East Carolina University, Greenville, NC 24601, U.S.A.
and
Virginia Polytechnic
E. SCOTT GELLER Institute and State University, Blacksburg,
VA 24601, U.S.A.
(Received 22 April 1985; in revised form 2 November 1985)
Abstract-Different types of awareness sessions to promote employee safety belt use were evaluated. Across eight different employee safety meetings three dichotomous variables were manipulated: the type of presentation format (lecture vs discussion), the presence or absence of safety belt pledge cards, and the presence or absence of an incentive component. All groups showed a four-fold increase in safety belt use. Five months after the interventions, belt use was still significantly higher than baseline levels. Generalization across employees was demonstrated by a significant increase in safety belt use for those who did not attend the awareness session. The awareness session with a discussion format influenced greater increases in safety belt use than did the lecture-based sessions, but pledge cards and incentives did not increase the impact of these awareness sessions.
A prime goal of American industry is to increase on-the-job safety. it is estimated that each worker fatality can cost corporations as much as $120,000 in direct payments to the beneficiaries, a price that does not include the costs associated with hiring and retraining to fill a vacant position [Pabon, Sims, Smith and Assoc., 19831. Although within-plant accident prevention continues to receive a large amount of research effort, industry has just begun to examine the problems related to accident prevention beyond company boundaries. For example, the corporate safety director for Ford Motor Company declared that for every company employee killed in a plant accident, 14 die in automobile accidents [Gast, 19841. However, the probability of death or serious injury in an automobile accident is reduced by 50% or more if vehicle occupants are wearing their safety belts [Highway Safety Research Center, 19761. Over the past six years, intervention to motivate safety belt usage has been studied in both community and industrial settings [see review by Geller, 19841. This research has produced a \,ariety of intervention approaches, the most effective involving the application of extrinsic rewards contingent on the wearing of vehicle safety belts. Different types of incentives have been used, including dinners, trinkets and small gifts [e.g. Geller, 1983; Geller, Davis and Spicer, 1983; Geller, Johnson and Pelton, 1982; Johnson and Geller, 1984; Spoonhour, 19811, 2s well as cash prizes [e.g. Geller and Hahn, 19841. Although these techniques have proved successful on a short-term basis, with levels of belt wearing reaching as high as 90% [e.g. Spoonhour, 19811, one-shot incentive programs (without intermittent booster sessions) have, for the most part, not produced large, long-term increases in belt wearing [cf. Status Report, 19821.
Attempts have been made to develop alternative strategies that can be combined with incentive strategies to produce longer-term gains in safety belt use. The most recent of these has involved the use of personal commitment tactics [e.g. Geller and Bigelow, 1984; Geller, Rudd and Talton, 1985; Nimmer and Geller, 19851. More specifically, corporate and hospital t mployees and church congregations have been asked to sign a pledge card that obligates them to wear their safety belts for a specified period of time. One such program at the General Motors “ethnical Center, using a combination of pledge cards, incentives and public feedback, increased the level of safety belt use to 70% and maintained a rate of 60% over a two-year follow-up period [Home and Terry, 1983; Home, T. D., personal communication with third author, November 19841. Another strategy that has been examined uses a special educational format to influence 243
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people to buckle their safety belts. For example, Geller and Hahn [ 19841 evaluated the behavioral impact of combining incentives with a special type of group discussion which they called an awareness session. First a 3-min film was shown to get the employees’ attention, and then Professor Geller led a 20-min, informal discussion of the advantages and disadvantages of buckling up. This sort of awareness session was shown to triple belt wearing by blue-collar workers, and later doubled the impact of an effective incentive program [Geller and Hahn, 19841. Given the prior evaluations of corporate-based tactics that were successful at increasing safety belt use, the present study was designed to examine the following: 1) the impact of safety belt awareness sessions incorporated into the occupational safety program of a large company, and 2) the comparative effectiveness of two types of presentation formats (traditional lecture vs employee discussion), the presence or absence of an opportunity to make a personal pledge to buckle up, and the presence or absence of a chance to participate in a safety belt incentive lottery campaign. A secondary goal was to examine the effects of these program components on maintaining the use of safety belts over a relatively long follow-up period.
METHOD
Subjects and Setting The research was conducted at a large North Carolina pharmaceutical plant located in an industrial park near the city of Greenville, North Carolina. The plant (Burroughs Wellcome Co.) was located on a 568-acre site surrounded by a security perimeter with two controlled points of access feeding into parking lots located on the east and west sides of the site. The organization employs a total of 1400 employees, about half of which are white-collar workers (e.g. managers, technicians and clerical employees), and half who are blue-collar workers who provide compounding, manufacturing and other drug production operations. Although the plant operates on two work shifts, all observations were made on “first shift” employees (about 90% of the Burroughs Wellcome staff) as they entered the parking lot in the morning (between 7:00 and 7:30 AM) and as they left work in the afternoon (between 4:00 and 4:30 PM). Data Collection Safety belt use data were obtained five days a week (i.e. Monday through Friday) from October 24, 1983, until April 20, 1984, and from September 4, 1984, through September 24, 1984, yielding a total of 115 observation days. At each of the gate locations, two data collectors were stationed so that they were out of direct traffic, yet still able to see adequately into the passing cars. Since traffic flow was at a higher rate than one car per second during the times of collection, data were not obtained for every passing automobile. Cars were targeted for data collection on a random “whenever ready” basis. After both collectors were finished recording data on the present target, the next available car was selected for the next set of observations. Each of the data collectors was responsible for obtaining from each vehicle: the vehicle license plate number, driver gender, the availability of a shoulder belt for the driver and driver shoulder-belt use. There was no attempt to record the use of lap belts; thus, vehicles without a shoulder belt available for the driver were excluded. For all of this information (except plate numbers), data were obtained independently by each observer in order to assess reliability. Both observers verified each license plate recording by coming to a consensus on the number before the car was out of sight. Experimental Phases The research period can be divided roughly into five experimental phases, termed: 1) Baseline; 2) Plant Announcement; 3) Awareness Sessions; 4) Post-Awareness Sessions and 5) Delayed Follow-Up. Following six weeks of Baseline data collection and prior to the awareness sessions, the employees were informed of the purpose of the project by a series of plant announcements placed on all major bulletin boards (at the cafeteria entrance/exit and at other strategic plant locations). All announcements remained in place until the end of the PostAwareness phase. Each announcement stated that the purpose of the project (and the reason for
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the observers at the plant gates) was to study traffic safety issues in general and to examine safety belt wearing in particular. The third phase started with the presentation of the first awareness session. In lieu of the mquired monthly plant safety meetings for all employees, 489 individuals were selected by management to participate in an awareness session related to safety belt wearing. Participants were selected primarily from two major departments within the plant: Production (Sterile Products and Packaging) and Engineering (Maintenance and Security). As was the practice for all safety meetings, group membership was determined by who could be spared from their jobs at the time of the scheduled meeting. The general practice was to encourage as many as possible to go to the meetings, yet no attempts were made to organize the sessions by occupational rank or by work area. Although none of the sessions contained employees solely from one type of job or from one particular organizational rank, most of the participants represented what can best be described as blue-collar workers in that supervisors, professional and clerical employees f -om these areas had already attended safety meetings earlier in the year. The type of awareness s:ssion presented on any particular day was determined randomly. Each of the eight awareness sessions lasted approximately 45 min and consisted of a short 3-min video tape showing tests with dummies undergoing crashes with and without the use of safety belts, followed by a lecture or discussion session. At each meeting two research assistants greeted the participants and took a roll of names. The names for each group were given to the F’ersonnel Department so that license numbers for the participants could be provided. (The Personnel Department keeps detailed records of all vehicles registered at the plant, in keeping with strict security measures common to most pharmaceutical plants. Thus, up-to-date records cf employee license plate numbers were available for all company personnel.) Subsequently, safety belt use per awareness group was categorized through the use of vehicle license numbers. The eight awareness sessions were conducted by a fixed team (i.e. the same members each t me) of four research assistants, each of whom had different responsibilities during the meetings. E;ach sessions was conducted by two of the assistants, while the other two assistants observed and recorded the procedures on audiotape and generally assisted the speakers throughout the session (e.g. helped with the audiovisual equipment in the lecture groups and participated in t le group discussions). The same two team members presented the material for the lecture groups, whereas the two other assistants presented the same information via group discussion. At the start of each session the plant’s Director of Safety introduced the four research assistants. Each lecture or discussion session was set up around the same key information. In order te:, provide consistency and accuracy of the presentations, one of the two observers closely rlonitored the proceedings and checked off the facts as they were presented. If any items were c mitted, one of the observers would bring up the point during prearranged pauses built into both F’resentation formats. Following the completion of the awareness sessions, data collection continued until April ‘20, 1984, without further experimental intervention. Five months after the completion of this Post-Awareness phase, data collection activities were restarted at the plant for an additional tlree weeks (i.e. the final Delayed Follow-Up phase). Intervention Strategies
During the Awareness Session phase, groups of employees were assigned by the Plant Safety Office to each of eight different awareness sessions. The awareness sessions were set up according to a 2 X 2 X 2 factorial design manipulating two levels of discussion groups (i.e. lecture vs discussion), two pledge card conditions (i.e. pledge card vs no pledge card), and two incentive conditions (i.e. a license plate lottery vs no lottery). A description of each condition follows. Lecture vs Discussion. Half of the groups (i.e. four) received a formal lecture and half an informal discussion style of presentation. In the lecture groups the speakers used a traditional l~ture format to present national statistics and facts concerning the value of safety belt usage 2nd possible consequences for nonuse. Each of two speakers presented roughly half of the material. Questions from the audience were not encouraged. In the discussion groups employees were also presented with facts concerning safety belt usage by two of the research assistants (again, each presented roughly half of the material).
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However, the discussion groups differed from the lecture groups in that the participants were encouraged to ask questions throughout the 45-min session. Indeed, the speakers went out into the audience and solicited testimonials, arguments and queries. Pledge vs No Pledge. At half of the sessions, pledge cards were distributed which requested the employee to “Be Assertive About Driver Safety and Take the Seat Belt Safety Pledge.” The employees were urged to sign the pledge cards which committed them to buckle up for two months. All pledge cards (signed and unsigned) were returned to the research assistants prior to leaving the awareness session. Incentives vs No Incentives. All employees in four of the eight groups were given a flyer at the end of the awareness session which discussed an incentive/lottery program. The flyer explained that every time an employee was seen buckled up when entering or leaving the plant, the vehicle license plate number would be entered in a weekly lottery. For each of the four incentive groups, a windbreaker jacket (valued at $50) was provided to the lottery winners at the end of the first and second weeks following the awareness session. Each of the four incentive groups was color coded (i.e. blue, gray, red and yellow) so that winning license numbers could be posted with clear group identification. On the last day of the two incentive weeks, posters were displayed in locations close to the work areas of the employees in the incentive groups. These posters displayed each winning license plate number along with the color code for the relevant group. Winners were instructed to go to the Plant Safety Office to claim their prizes. Before a prize was provided all winning license plate numbers were verified by the Director of Plant Safety from plant personnel records. Weekly group winners were selected randomly by having the computer sort the license numbers of daily belt users into the four separate incentive groups. The winning license number per group was then selected by a random drawing.
RESULTS
Interobserver Reliability Two data collectors obtained independent data entries for 16,097 of the total 22,005 observations, 73.2% of the total sample. An index of interobserver agreement was obtained on all observations of shoulder belt wearing and shoulder belt availability for the driver. Observer reliabilities were calculated by dividing the number of times that the two observers agreed on a particular response category by the total number of paired observations taken of the response, and then multiplying the quotient by 100 to convert to agreement percentages. The following reliability percentages were obtained: 1) 94.0% agreement for driver usage of shoulder belts; 2) 97.2% agreement for shoulder belt available but not worn; and 3) 78.4% agreement for shoulder belt unavailable. Awareness vs No Awareness A total of 2894 safety belt observations was obtained on the 489 individuals who took part in an awareness session, and 11,406 observations were taken for the remaining 9 11 employees who did not attend an awareness session. For purposes of analysis, daily percentages of driver shoulder belt use were collapsed into weekly averages (as shown in Fig. 1). Each data point represents the mean shoulder belt use across five consecutive days of observation. Through the use of a two-way ANOVA the data were analyzed according to a 2(Awareness Session: attending vs not attending an awareness session) x S(Experimenta1 Group: baseline, plant announcements, awareness sessions, post-awareness sessions, and delayed follow-up) experimental design. The main effect for Awareness Session, which was found to be significant, F( 1,200) = 6.11, p < .05, indicated that employees in the awareness session groups showed higher levels of shoulder belt use, M = 25.77%, than did their no awareness session counterparts, M = 2 1.05%. The main effect for Experimental Phase was also found to be significant, F(4,200) = 56.65, p < .OOl. A post hoc Scheffe’ test across the five phases showed that employees who attended an awareness session increased belt wearing significantly (p < ,001) during the Post-Awareness Session Phase (M = 44.4%) from Baseline (M = 11.3%), and remained at a significantly
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safety belt use
60 0 Awareness
sessions
0 No awareness
Awareness Sessions End
sessions
Plant Announcement
Awareness Sessions Begin
-
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
Consecutive Fig. 1. Mean weekly shoulder
6
g
10
11
12
Observation
13 14
15 16
17
16
39
40 41
Weeks
belt use across experimental phases for those attending awareness session.
and not attending
an
elevated level (p < .OOl) five months later during Delayed Follow-Up (M = 26.6%). Further, employees who did not attend an awareness session showed a similar trend. A post-hoc Scheffe’ tl:st again revealed a significant increase (p < .OOl) during the Post-Awareness (M = 31.0%) and Delayed Follow-Up (M = 29.5%) periods when compared to Baseline (M = 11.0%). Therefore, the subjects who were not directly exposed to any of the awareness sessions also i lcreased their shoulder belt use, albeit to a lesser extent than those who attended the awareness sessions. In other words, increasing the awareness of a particular group of employees about the value of safety belts seemed to carry over to the rest of the plant employees who did not participate in the training, indicating generalization of the intervention impact. This point was further supported by the fact that the interaction effect also proved to be significant, F(4,200) = 4.02, p < .Ol. A significantly differential rate of shoulder belt use between those who did and did not attend an awareness session occurred only after all the awareness sessions were completed (i.e. during the Post-Awareness Phase), F(166) = 24.4, vs “non-awareness” employees was not I;# < ,001. That is, shoulder belt use for “awareness” found to be significantly different at any other phase except Post-Awareness. Ijipe of Awareness Session The percentage of shoulder belt usage was calculated for each of the eight sessions, yielding sn average for each type of session. Table 1 shows the percentage of belt wearing across experimental phase as a function of each component of the awareness sessions. The data demonstrate generally higher levels of belt wearing across the different phases through Post-Awareness. The highest Post-Awareness levels of wearing were actually obtained by those groups in the No Pledge Card (M = 58.3%) and the No Incentive (M = 57.5%) conditions; and the IDwest levels of wearing were obtained by those groups in the Pledge Card (M = 28.2%) and the Incentive (M = 29.0) conditions. The same pattern was repeated five months later, during the Delayed Follow-Up phase, where again the employees in the No Pledge Card (M = 49.9%) 2nd the No Incentive conditions (M = 45.2%) maintained the highest level of belt wearing. Since all the groups gained in comparison to baseline levels, an examination of the relationship between groups might best be shown by examining the difference between Baseline
11.1 14.3 19.9 43.9 27.7
%
896 279 458 822 439
N
Total Awareness Groun
11.4 14.2 14.9 32.4 30.5
%
4.4 6.6 11.8 28.2 22.6
8
N 431 158 230 377 164
Pledge Card
per condition
2267 625 981 1774 2882
N
Total No Awareness Group
20.3 29.1 31.8 58.3 49.9
%
N
465 121 228 445 275
No Pledge
13.0 16.6 22.4 42.7 31.9
%
325 106 179 340 179
N
Lecture
Il.6 19.1 21.2 43.8 40.6
9% 571 173 279 482 260
N
Discussion
6.1 2.9 9.2 29.0 27.3
%
344 103 185 375 176
N
Incentive
Mean percent wearing shoulder belts as a function of separate awareness session components
Note. N = total number of observations
Baseline Announcement Awareness Post Awareness Delayed Follow-Up
Phase
Table I
18.5 32.8 34.4 57.5 45.2
9%
552 176 273 447 263
N
No Incentive
Promoting T,Ible 2. Difference -
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in mean percent wearing safety belts as a function of separate components
h, ean Difference in Safety Belt Use Between Baseline and Post Awareness Phases Between Baseline and Delayed Follow-Up Phases
of the awareness
sessions
Total Awareness
Total No Awareness
Pledge Card
No Pledge Card
Lecture
Discussion
Incentive
No Incentive
32.8
21.0
23.8
38.0
29.-l
32.2
22.9
39.0
16.6
19.1
18.2
29.6
18.9
29.0
21.2
26.1
2nd each of the later phases of interest. Hence, the percentage of employees wearing safety belts during Baseline for each awareness session component was subtracted from that obtained cluring the Post-Awareness and Delayed Follow-Up phases. These difference scores are presented in Table 2. As shown for the absolute comparisons, the largest gains against Baseline were made by those groups getting No Pledge Cards, No Incentive and a Discussion Group format. In summary, all of the awareness sessions were successful in raising the level of safety belt wearing during the period following their completion and in maintaining an increased level of belt use over a five-month period. Pledge cards were not, however, found to yield higher levels of belt wearing than that found in groups not receiving this commitment intervention. Furthermore, the use of an incentive strategy was not successful in producing higher rates of shoulder belt wearing compared to the no-incentive conditions. DISCUSSION
Baseline levels of safety belt use at a large pharmaceutical plant were not greatly different from the national average of just over 12% reported in the National Register [ 1983, October]. However, by the end of the study, belt wearing had been increased to over 44% or to almost four times the original baseline levels. Indeed, the study demonstrated that even five months later, the rate of usage was still almost twice that of baseline. This maintenance finding is particularly noteworthy because the only other evaluation of similar awareness sessions continued post-awareness follow-up for only three weeks [Geller and Hahn, 19841. Hence, the present ! tudy demonstrated for the first time that certain types of awareness sessions can be effective in motivating increases in safety belt use over relatively long time periods. It was particularly noteworthy that many employees not exposed to an awareness session of any kind were also found to show substantial increases in belt wearing compared to baseline usage levels. These findings are indicative of intervention generalization across employees. In other words, employees not participating in the awareness sessions showed some carry-over effects from those who attended a session. Indeed, this is a reasonable outcome, since the c:mployees who attended the awareness sessions were often arbitrarily selected from areas in c,lose proximity to work units containing employees who were not selected to attend an awareness $,ession. Given the informal group network that exists in most industrial settings, it is difficult to control for employee inter-group communication, which was quite likely in the present study. It is probable that many who participated in an awareness session returned to their respective work or break areas with reports of the session events. Once word of the study was circulated, the data collectors at the gate probably served as daily reminders to all employees throughout the plant that a special safety belt project was under way. Thus, even the non-treated employees may have been prompted to wear their safety belts through peer interaction and daily reminders. These findings are important to future industrial r,pplications in that they suggest that the impact of a safety belt awareness campaign for a select group of employees can snowball across large numbers of plant personnel. However, where communication between the “awareness’ and “no awareness session” groups can be seen as a benefit to the plant as a whole, communication between members of the different individual treatment groups could have masked inter-group differences and thus confounded the effect of the various intervention strategies. Yet it is reasonable to assume that the effects of this communication between treatment groups would be consistent across all of the groups. There was no evidence that any one group was more or less likely to have access
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to the others as all of the groups came from the same general physical areas within the plant. Since it is usually unrealistic to expect to totally isolate groups of employees in an industrial setting, it may be more realistic and utilitarian to strive for externally valid results in a naturalistic setting than to rigidly guard against problems of internal validity. The outcome from comparing the effectiveness of the various types of awareness sessions was unexpected and somewhat disappointing. Groups receiving no incentives and no opportunity to make a safety belt pledge actually showed greater increases in shoulder belt wearing than did their counterparts who received opportunities to win incentive prizes and/or signed commitment pledge cards. Geller [1984] has reviewed an extensive literature concerning successful applications of incentive-type strategies to influence safety belt use. Results across the various corporate-based studies showed that most gains from baseline to intervention periods exceeded lOO%, indicating that incentives work remarkably well to motivate safety belt use in industrial settings. One possible explanation for the failure of the incentive scheme in the present study to motivate increased safety belt use was that the type of reward (i.e. a Burroughs Wellcome jacket) may not have been appropriate for this particular sample of employees. Comments were heard throughout the plant such as “who needs another jacket?“. Also, the original jacket selected for the project was later replaced by the Plant Safety Office with a cheaper and more commonly available jacket sold throughout the company. Past safety belt research (as reviewed by Geller, 1984) has indicated that a variety of different rewards have been used successfully, ranging from small trinkets and candy up to a $12,000 automobile. What seems to be important is finding a reward that is salient for a particular audience or population. Yet, the problem is not as easy to solve as simply increasing the number or value of the rewards. There is ample evidence in the social psychological literature to suggest that the value of a reward should not exceed that which is necessary to initiate the target behavior [Deci, 1975; Festinger, 1957 and 19641. Rewards should not be so large that they become the only factor influencing safety belt wearing, because upon their removal there is no internal justification or personal rationale to sustain behavior. Since personal commitment strategies have recently been applied successfully in church and corporate settings [Geller and Bigelow, 1984; Geller, Rudd and Talton, 19851, it was surprising to find that the pledge card strategies did not increase the behavioral impact of the awareness sessions. One possibility for the Pledge Card groups actually showing less increase in safety belt wearing than their No Pledge Card counterparts is that the pledge card procedure may not have been taken seriously. Across the four pledge card groups, the percentage of individuals who actually signed the cards was low. Only 22% of the employees in the Group Discussion with Incentives and Lecture with Incentives groups signed a card. In the group getting a discussion format with no incentive, 35% signed a card. Of those getting a lecture format with no incentive, 43% signed and returned the card. Signing a card pledging to wear a safety belt for a short period of time (i.e. only two months) may not have held a great deal of significance for employees, since the card was presented by and returned to non-employees of the organization. It is possible that a pledge card system which is given more significance by carrying strong company endorsement may prove to be more effective. Perhaps making a personal pledge should be the focal point of an awareness session, and a great deal of emphasis placed on fostering the importance of the commitment decision (both from the format of the awareness session and the organizational milieu). Another related point concerns the ability of the session leaders to generate the type of climate necessary for making a public pledge. In earlier more successful studies of personal commitment strategies (e.g. Geller and Bigelow, 1984; Geller, Rudd and Talton, 1985), the group leader was a very dynamic and enthusiastic speaker with a long history of public presentations. It is possible that the research assistants used in the present study were unable to generate the type of climate necessary to promote a public pledge. Yet, the fact that more of the employees who received the lecture format signed pledge cards than did their counterparts who got a more dynamic discussion style of presentation, does not lend support to this contention. CONCLUSIONS
In summary, the present study demonstrated that an awareness session approach can be readily worked into the ongoing day-to-day operations of a large industry and can have a
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substantial effect on the use of safety belts by plant personnel. Of particular interest were the findings that plant-wide increases in belt wearing were observed with only a fraction of the employees (i.e. 35%) receiving a direct awareness/education intervention, and incentives and personal commitment strategies may not be essential ingredients for substantial behavior change. What does appear to be important is the adoption of an interactive style of discussion that engages employee questions in an informal manner. The significance of this finding lies in the realization t?at it did not require professional consultants to provide this type of promotional campaign. The fact that many companies already use discussion-type employee groups in the course of t-aining makes the use of awareness sessions particularly feasible for industrial applications. It should be noted that the speakers in the present study were students, not professional safety experts, several of whom were speaking for the first time in public. Thus, almost anyone, armed with a suitable set of facts, could easily replicate the awareness session process of this study. Acknowledgments-This research was partially supported by U.S. Department of Transportation Contract DTR57683C -0050 awarded to the third author. The authors are grateful for helpful suggestions from Ralph Dudley of Burroughs V’Jellcome Co. and for the special research assistance of Richard Duke, Margo Green, June Gunter, Sheryl Moy, Lori Pate, Sherri Peterson and Gretchen Smith.
REFERENCES Lleci E. L., intrinsic motivation. Plenum, New York, 1975. Festinger L., A theory afcognirive dissonance. Stanford University Press, Stanford, CA, 1957. Festinger L., Conflict, decision and dissonance. Stanford University Press, Stanford, CA, 1964. Cast D., Tech teacher uses psychology in urging people to buckle up. Richmond Times-Dispatch, pp. 1, 9, December 1984. C eller E. S., Rewarding safety belt use at an industrial setting: Tests of treatment generality and response maintenance. J. Appl. Beh. Anal. 16, 43-56, 1983. Geller E. S., Motivating safety belt use with incentives: A critical review of the past and a look to the future. SAE Technical Paper Series (No. 840326). Society of Automotive Engineers, Warrendale, PA, 1984. Geller E. S. and Bigelow B. E., Development of corporate incentive programs for motivating safety belt use: A review. Traffic Safety Eval. Res. Rev. 3 (5), 1984. Geller E. S. and Hahn H. A., Promoting safety belt use at industrial sites: An effective program for blue collar employees. J. Professional Psych.: Res. and Pracr. 15, 553-564, 1984. Geller E. S., Davis L. and Spicer K., Industry-based incentives for promoting seat belt usage: Differential impact on white collar vs. blue collar employees. J. Organizational Beh. Management 5, 17-29, 1983. Geller E. S., Johnson R. P. and Pelton S. L., Community-based interventions for encouraging safety belt use. Amer. J. Community Psych. 10,183-195, 1982. Geller E. S., Rudd J. R. and Talton A., Increasing safety belt use at corporate and church settings: The role of pledgecard commitment. Manuscript in preparation, 1985. Highway Safety Research Center Belts-Questions and answers. Highway Safety Highlighfs 10, 1, December 1976. Home T. D., Workshop presentation at the Michigan Life Savers Conference, Boyne Mountain, Michigan, November 1984. Home T. D. and Terry T., Seat belt sweepstakes-An incentive program. SAE Technical Paper Series (No. 8f3047), Society of Automotive Engineers, Inc., Warrendale, PA, 1983. Jc hnson R. P. and Geiler E. S., Contingent versus noncontingent rewards for promoting seat belt usage. J. Community Psych. 12, 113-122, 1984. N mmer J. G. and Geller E. S., A hospital based safety belt program: Awareness sessions, pledge cards, and incentives. Manuscript in preparation, 1985. Pi bon, Sims, Smith and Assoc., Inc., Motivation of employers to encourage their employees to use safety belts: Phase II. Final report for Contract DTNH 22-80-C 07439 from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. U.S. Department of Transportation, Washington, D.C., 1983. Slroonhour K. A., Company snap-it-up campaign achieves 90 percent belt use. Traflc Safely, pp. 18-19, 31-32. 1981. Rl:wards raise belt use: Fall-off seen later. Status Report, pp. 1-2. Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, Washington, D.C., February 17, 1982.