The Influence of the University Laboratory Safety Climate on Students’ Safety Behavior: The Parallel Mediating Effects of Ability and Motivation

Abstract

Students’ unsafe behavior is the main factor related to accidents in university laboratories. The safety climate is an important factor that affects individual safety behavior on the organizational level. Therefore, to improve the effect of university laboratory safety management, based on the theoretical framework of AMO and the SEM method, the influence of the laboratory safety climate on the safety compliance behavior and safety participation behavior of 500 university students in China was investigated and analyzed. The results show that safety ability and safety motivation play parallel mediating roles, and their synergistic effect promotes the generation of safety behavior: the safety climate in the laboratory has a direct positive effect on both safety compliance behavior and safety participation behavior; safety knowledge and safety skills have significant mediating effects on both safety compliance behavior and safety participation behavior in the laboratory safety climate; external safety motivation has a significant mediating effect on safety compliance behavior and safety participation behavior in the laboratory safety climate; and internal safety motivation does not have a mediating effect on safety compliance behavior and safety participation behavior in the laboratory safety climate. To improve students’ safety behavior performance, measures such as strengthening the construction of the dynamic improvement mechanism of the laboratory safety climate, optimizing the laboratory safety access system, and taking comprehensive measures to ensure the continuous positive influence of the safety climate on students’ safety behavior can be adopted.