ABSTRACT
Across many industries there is now a requirement for the implementation of a Safety Management System (SMS) including proactive risk assessment (Leveson 2011). For example, within the aerospace industry there is the European policy for aeronautical repair stations (EASA 145) which specifies a requirement for collecting proactive information on risks and hazards as they are encountered within the life cycle of the organisation (Pérezgonzález, McDonald, & Smith, 2005). A reporting system is an effective way of addressing these requirements and collecting information on hazards from the workforce. Many reporting approaches use reports submitted from the “shop floor” as one of the inputs on risk and hazards that will be managed by the SMS. There has been significant literature on the factors that can influence the level of reporting within the organisation from the design of the data collection forms, to the procedure, to cultural considerations of the SMS system (Johnson, 2003; Leveson, 2011). However, before reporting a hazard, the reporter has to successfully notice and identify the hazard. The literature in the area to date has not investigated this aspect of reporting. The study reported here took advantage of an exhibition called the “Risk Lab” in the Science Gallery in Trinity College Dublin to explore the rate at which the general public will notice, identify and report hazards. Although outside an industrial setting, the hazards used in the study represented a clear and recognisable danger to the public.
