Research Interests:
Industrial Incident Investigation
In 2005 industrial accidents were responsible for 5 deaths per working day in Canada (AWCBC, 2007). In 2000 it was reported that for every minute worked, $77,500 in compensation payments are paid to workers for accident injuries (HRSDC, 2000). Conducting a thorough investigation and arriving at the right conclusions post-incident (or near miss) is the key to instituting the appropriate corrective actions to prevent future (potentially more egregious) accidents. I study factors that threaten the accuracy of the industrial investigation.
Investigator
Once an attitude has been formed, individuals seek, interpret, and create information to support those preconceived notions. The psychological literature refers to the tendency to seek information that supports our beliefs while ignoring disconfirming information as confirmation bias; in the legal literature this phenomenon is dubbed tunnel vision.
There are a number of potential sources of investigative bias, e.g., personal prejudices, attributional errors. For instance, in a recent survey of 185 Canadian industrial investigators, 88% of respondents indicated that the accident/near miss investigator in their work setting is an employee of the organization, that is, these individuals complete in-house investigations. The contextual knowledge that comes with familiarity with the work environment can be a powerful tool that allows people to draw conclusions that go beyond the information at hand. However, this same contextual information can lead to bias decision making as investigators may seek information that supports their preconceived notions. My most recent research tests interventions aimed at minimizing investigative tunnel vision in industrial investigation.
Eyewitness
Hundreds of studies tell us that eyewitness memory is fragile, malleable, and susceptible to forgetting, even in optimal conditions. The majority of studies exploring the fragility of memory take place within the context of a “criminal scenario”. There is reason to believe that the delicate nature of memory can be generalized to the context of industrial accidents as both scenarios share similarity as negative emotional events. Det Norske Veritas states in their incident investigation manual that “people evidence” is “perhaps the most difficult type of evidence the investigator must gather” and it is “vital to finding the basic cause of the incident”. Thus, the applied value of studying eyewitness recall in the context of workplace accidents is clear: Obtaining complete and accurate eyewitness reports are a key element in preventing similar tragedies in the future. I am interested in studying those elements that could lead to inaccurate witness recall post-event.
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