An exploratory study of underlying causes of consumer accidents involving machines and ladders.

Many people perform DIY-tasks at home, using products such as power tools and ladders. Accidents with severe consequences happen during these tasks. Research on this topic is for a large part based on hospital registrations, and only provides insights in injuries, prevalence and direct causes (what went wrong at the very last moment). However, still very little is known about what happened leading up to these accidents. In order to improve prevention of these accidents, more in-depth knowledge on this topic is necessary. Therefore we performed an exploratory study of underlying causes of consumer accidents involving machines and ladders. Both experts and consumers who perform DIY tasks were interviewed. The group of experts consisted of social scientists with different orientations, such as risk perception, behavioural influence, social psychology, cognitive psychology and safety. Some of the experts work at large Dutch producers of power tools and ladders, where they perform accidents analyses. They were asked what they think are possible underlying causes of DIY accidents with power tools and ladders. The results were analyzed and visualized in a conceptual framework. Consumers who often perform DIY tasks were questioned about topics such as preparation of tasks, product use, use of information and safety behaviour. Finally, we compared the possible underlying causes of accidents according to experts with the insights gained from consumer interviews. According to experts, many factors can contribute to the occurrence of accidents during DIY tasks. Most of these were behavioural factors. Three specific behaviours were mentioned: 1) incorrect use of products 2) using a product that is unsuitable for the tasks and 3) using a product that is in poor condition. Underlying causes of these behaviours are for example a lack of knowledge and underestimation of the risk of an accident. In the conceptual framework that will be shown during the presentation, many more underlying factors on different levels will be shown. Many of the causes mentioned by experts, were also identified in the consumer interviews. For example, all consumers that were interviewed estimated the risk of an accident occurring to be low. The framework of underlying causes of accidents during DIY will be used for future studies on consumer- and product safety. A follow-up study is planned for 2023, regarding the perception of risk or decision-making regarding the use of products.

Keywords: Safety, consumers, products, DIY, machines, ladders, behaviour, psychology