February 18, 2007
Interview with Professor Remi Kouabenan, University Grenoble II France
EJOP Editor
Mihaela Popa Chraif
Professor Remi D. Kouabenan is Professor of Psychology Applied in Work and Organizational Psychology at the University Pierre Mendès France Grenoble II, France and the coordinator of the master of Psychology Applied in Work. He received his Ph.D in 1982 at the University Paris V, Sorbona and “École Pratique des Hautes Études” (the psychology applied in work laboratory). Also, Professor Kouabenan has initiated in cooperation with the University II Lyon (now he is co-director) the project: Achieving the diploma “The Psychological Management of the Organization”. His research is focused on the explanation of the accidents’ factors and prevention strategies, the perception and prevention of the accidents’ risks, the cognitive processes in work, behavior related to transportation. Professor Kouabenan is member of different scientific and Professional associations: The international Association on Applied Psychology, The International Association of Work Psychology, the Association of American Psychologists, the Association for international researches issuing in Social Psychology and the European Association of Organizational Psychology. Professor Kouabenan is member and associate editor to many journals: Psychologie du Travail et des Organisations, Journal of Psychology in Africa, Journal of Applied Social Psychology, Swiss Journal of Psychology, Risk, European Journal of Social Psychology, Le Travail Humain, Psychologie du Travail et des Organisations, Bulletin de psychologie, Pratiques Psychologiques, European Review of Applied psychology, Scandinavian Journal of Psycholog and Europe’s Journal of Psychology.
EJOP: How do you see the accident prevention and the interaction standards in the public health?
Prof. Kouabenan: I think at the personnel level accident prevention become more necessary and now they turn to have some standards for accident preventions even ergonomics standards.
EJOP: How do you see the work legislation in the developing countries today, from the accident risk point of view?
Prof. Kouabenan: The work legislation is the same like in the European countries or other developed countries. The problem is not the legislation itself but the fact that legislation is not been implemented. This morning I have discussed with some Romanian workers the matter that they have the legislation but the problem is that the organization didn’t implement it until now. And I have an example in Africa, I’ve been asked to observe if the regulations are implemented. The regulations are similar to regulations in France, but they are not implemented even by the western / EU companies in Africa. They don’t follow the U.S.A. regulations in developing countries. First is the problem of implementing and after the employee must comply to it.
EJOP: From the EU point of view do you think that Romanian people will adapt fast to EU standards of work?
Prof. Kouabenan: I think it is possible but rather difficult, because of many factors: Romanian style of living, their culture, the experience. You see, when you plan to work in low standards of work conditions it is difficult to understand how is to work in high standards work conditions. Therefore will be problems of representation of culture, from the part of the employers and from the part of the employees. So, it will be difficult, but what to do? You already have the EU directives. If the Romanians want to integrate them in the EU committees, they have to do their best to follow these directives; otherwise will cause policies conflicts.
EJOP: How do you see the loss of autonomy and decrease in self-esteem at the victim’s level: physical suffering, traumas and disabilities?
Prof Kouabenan: This question is important because when I talk about accidents, most of the employers see the economical and financial costs. In fact we have also the psychological cost and one of the psychological costs is the loss of autonomy when the employee is insured and sometimes can be disable to work. An example can be the situation when the worker can’t move as he would like to, therefore its geographical mobility is reduced, this fact limiting his socially mobility as well. The self esteem is also affected: the employee cannot be able to offer to his family anything they wants, and sometimes he depends on them to write(physical traumas), read(blindness) , so the people in this situation could suffer of very low self esteem and esthetic harm of image caused by injured.
If your self-esteem is lower – you cannot see yourself useful for the society as before. This is a critical point causing depressions. So the psychologist must be patient and counseling to pay attention to them, not to hurt more, they are not lost for all kinds of jobs, just they have to be flexible and to adapt at the work. Talking about hands one feet (members) loss, they have to adapt to another types of job, not to fall into depression. When somebody is injured (accident) and is loosing his job, except for the body mobility, he could be more depressed than the physical disability caused by the accident. The society of our days values the job, the profession. So who doesn’t have a job seems to be useless, and if the useless comes from the accidents it is double damaging.
EJOP: As long as the cost of the victim training, the cost of substitution and loss of earnings are so high after the accident occurred why the organizations don’t pay attention to prevention trainings in developing countries?
Prof. Kouabenan: This is also an important question to be highlighted. I think we have to convince the managers that they have many tools to prevent the accidents. They usually say: “I don’t have to spend money on this”, but they have to know what can gain more if they prevent the accidents. Thus, the workers will stay at work for long time in a healthy condition they will be trained in accident preventions and minimizing accidents’ risk and what is important to know is that the cost of the prevention is lower than the costs of the damages and the unproductive worker after the accident has occurred. The managers should calculate the cost of prevention and should understand the economical and the psychological use of it.
EJOP: How do you see the relationship between stress and accident?
Prof Kouabenan: So, it is difficult to be objective. More stress could increase the probability of the accident occurring. For example time pressure: when you do the movements quickly, you can miss some steps of the procedures, so the risk of the accident is higher. To do a task, you have to follow some steps and when you do quickly or you want to finish fast you jump over important steps and the accident has occurred.
EJOP: Could you please explain to us if there is any relationship between the organizational culture and the accident risk probability of occurring.
Prof. Kouabenan: Yes. Now it is demonstrated by studies that it is a strong relationship between the organizational culture, the national cultures, occupational culture and accident probability.
Some of these cultures, for example the organizational culture creates the social climate for the organizations. If the organizations don’t value the safety of the employer, people cannot be saved. So the culture is a strong determinant. People have to work with safety equipment and this has to be reinforced by the organization’s culture.
The climate offered by the organizations to the people is an important determinant for the probability of accident occurrence.