Why Safety Knowledge Cannot be Transferred Directly to Expected Safety Outcomes in Construction Workers: The Moderating Effect of Physiological Perceived Control and Mediating Effect of Safety Behavior

The construction industry is notorious for its high accident and workplace injury rates. High rates of construction workplace injuries, including fatalities, occur worldwide in both developed and developing nations. Our study examines the effects of safety behavior and physiological perceived control (PPC) on the relationship between safety knowledge and outcomes. We examined this relationship by focusing on the mediating role of safety behavior and the moderating role of PPC. We employed a time-lagged design to collect data. Field survey results from 385 site workers from construction sites in the Yangtze region of China show that safety behavior mediated the positive relationship between safety knowledge and outcomes. Furthermore, PPC strengthens the relationship between safety knowledge and safety behavior. The results indicate that workers’ safety knowledge may not transform into expected safety behavior and performance if they experience low levels of PPC. These findings provide new insights into levels of PPC as a boundary condition for understanding the relationships among safety knowledge, safety behavior, and safety outcomes. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of our findings.