Visual Literacy and Occupational Safety
Visual literacy has typically been associated with either lingual or artwork, but there is growing evidence of the importance in occupational safety.
As defined by the Toledo Museum of Art, visual literacy is “being able to read, comprehend, and write visual language. If we apply this definition to safety, it means, “being able to see what’s in front of us, being able to interpret what that means from a safety perspective, and take the appropriate actions”.
By training workers and staff to be visually literate in safety, we are providing them with a greater understanding of their surroundings through visual means. Teaching visual literacy focuses on five essential elements: line, shape, colour, texture, and space. By breaking down work environments, individuals are better able to pinpoint potential hazards and convey their observations, in common language, to others.
As workers become more visually literate, they can perceive and understand more about their work environment, enabling them to see hazards and imaging the potential consequences that can result from those hazards (sensitized to the work environment). This makes workers more proactive about their environment and take measures to mitigate hazards before an incident.
A limitation to training visual literacy in the workplace is that it is difficult to perceive safety because we are used to seeing safe conditions and perceive them as “normal”. These “norms” are the “noise” to potential hazards, the “signal”. Workers become blinded by the “noise” of safe conditions, preventing them from accurately perceiving the unsafe conditions. The intention to train visual literacy for safety is to give workers the ability to see past safe conditions and pinpoint the hazards.
One tool that has been effectively used in the past to identify and implement controls for hazards is a Job Safety Analysis (JSA) or Job Hazard Recognition Analysis (JHRA). While a foundation in any safety program, it does have some drawbacks. JHRAs can be influenced by prior experience, whereby workers may gloss over details that indicate a potential hazard due to them being accustomed to the work. Workers who become more visually aware through training will focus on situations more and have less automatic responses when completing a hazard analysis document.
An effective method for teaching visual literacy for safety is to have workers look for hazards based on the specific energy sources (motion, gravity, radiation, mechanical, electrical, chemical, etc.). This changes their perception of the work environment and actively engages them in observing hazards in the workplace with a new perspective.
Metrics that can be collected and compared to pre/post visual literacy training include:
Number of proactive hazard recognition reports
Number of stop work orders filed
Frequency of JHRA/JSAs completed
Number or percent of “all clear” JHRAs submitted (closer to 100% could be evidence of non-compliance or “blindness” to hazards)
How completely is the JHRA it filled out and was it completed by the full team
Is consistent and understandable hazard language used
Increases in novel types of hazards may note a higher visual literacy and hazard recognition
Visual Biases
There are three types of visual biases;
1. Sometimes you cannot see what is in front of you, even if you know it is there
Can you tell what is in the picture? Once you see the colour image, it becomes apparent in both photos.
2. Once you see something, it is impossible to “un-see” it
Take the below picture for example:
While the top and bottom images look different, can you tell that the chess pieces in the top and bottom half are actually the same colour?
Here it is in a different perspective without the background:
Our ability to see things depends on the environment or background.
3. You are always filling in the blanks based on what you expect to be there
An example of filling in the “blanks” depending on what you expect to see:
Even if we remove some letters, you are still able to read it:
These examples, provided in the Campbell Institute white paper, high the natural visual biases and how our visual literacy skills can be improved when we move beyond the biases. After a concentrated effort to see the work environment with “fresh” eyes, we are more likely to pick up potential hazards.
By integrating visual exercises, focusing on consistent description terminology, and becoming aware of and moving past visual biases, workers are more likely to proactively identify and correct safety hazards before they cause an incident.
Safety is the common theme in any organization, regardless of size or industry, and by teaching fundamental concepts of safety, workplaces can successfully apply hazard identification and recognition at all levels.
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