Work Overload and Lack of Sleep – Implications and Solutions for Workplace Safety Interventions

摘要

This two-study paper presents why and how work overload and insomnia can relate to workplace injuriesrnin service companies serving the offshore and onshore oil and gas industry. Utilizing the self-regulatoryrnresource theory, we argue that both overload and insomnia decrease workers’ safety behaviors, resultingrnin increased workplace injuries. Moreover, in order to ultimately derive organizational interventions tornalleviate the detrimental impact of insomnia on workplace injuries, we propose that supervisor safetyrnpriority can create situation strength that can prevent workers from behaving unsafely despite experiencingrnhigh workload and insomnia. We present two studies testing the insomnia-safety outcome andrnoverload-safety outcome relationships respectively. Results were consistent with the proposed conceptualrnframework, the relationship between insomnia and injuries is explained by the influence of insomnia onrnsafety behaviors, and the relationship between overload and outcomes was also alleviated throughrnsituation strength. For employees supervised by supervisors with high safety priority, both the relationshiprnbetween insomnia and safety behaviors and the indirect relationship between insomnia and workplacerninjuries were weaker. We propose theoretical implications for future safety research and suggest tentativerndirections for practitioners working to reduce workplace injuries through work overload and sleeporientedrninterventions.