Ergonomics and Workplace Psychology - Essay Example

1.0. Introduction The Musculoskeletal disorders lead to disabilities in places of work. The statistics by the government show that these disorders were responsible for a quarter of benefits from incapacity claims in the United Kingdom. This high occurrence of MSD has been confirmed with published research. For example, random survey that was carried out in large scale in 1995, show that MSD was accountable for 57 percent of reports of illnesses that are work related. Likewise, analysis of data by some researchers in Netherlands showed a 27% report of back pains, 8% problems of chronic back and 24% joint and muscle complains (Bongers et al., 2002). The task performed by environmental and personal factors that are related to MSD, in particular pain at the lower back, have been studied in medicine, psychology, and epidemiology. Demographic variables, physical demands, and psychological conditions importance have been involved. Example of recent prospective lessons shows typical findings. From the findings it was concluded that psychological, organizational, social factors and mechanical exposures are associated to increased cases of back pain. Similarly, work related psychosocial and physical factors affected both the recurrence and incidence of this pain. Particularly, demand of high work, low control and manual handling, were related to back pain recurrence. A new start of paining backs was found predictable merely by y combining psychosocial and physical work factors inclusive of pulling weights, kneeling, monotonous and stressful and hot conditions of work. Generally, psychosocial factors played a major role in the prediction of the beginning of pains at the lower back. With the regular studies, a prolonged review of MSD publications summarized that tangible evidence was present for cases related to back disorders. However, a present paper notes the small findings of various reviews of literature. Buying a theoretical perspective to this problem of MSD, several pathway models by which psychosocial, organizational, individual factors and work related lead to MSD disability and impairment have been used. Such models give conceptual frameworks showing the processes through which psychosocial, physiological and physical factors join to lead to MSD. However, characteristics such as physical work and age are direct causes of MSD, the way through which psychosocial aspect are implicated haven’t been clarified. A limitation of these researches is that as much the conditions at work are seen as factors leading to MSD, the work activities and demands haven’t been evaluated empirically. In addition to that, there is a possibility that perception of specific risks at work is related differently to occurrence of MSD symptoms. In the current study, there is a combination of cross sectional data analysis on male workers in UK. According to them their main aim of working was: determination of weekly prevalence of symptoms related to MSD, enhancement of understanding on factors that lead to the cause of MSD and examination of beliefs on what leads to MSD and relation of the attributions to the characteristics of job and psychosocial factors. 2.0. Psychosocial factors related to MSD Psychosocial factors are those factors that pose physical risks for instance, posture, repetition and force which are harmful to humans and can cause musculoskeletal disorders to develop. However, researchers have shown that these risk factors need to consideration. These are those factors that might affect the response of workers psychologically in their places of work and work conditions. Some of these psychosocial factors include: tight deadlines, high workloads and unable to control working and work methods. As much as psychosocial risks lead to stress, that is harmful, it can also lead to MSD. For instance, body changes can occur which are associated to stress which can make humans vulnerable to MSD. Individuals may also change their usual behavior, for instance working without rests in order to fight deadlines. Therefore, both psychosocial and physical factors have to be controlled and identified for reasons of deriving great benefits. The most appropriate way to arrive at this achievement is by the use of ergonomic approach that aims at achieving what is termed as best fit to mean, perfect balance between working environment, work and workers capabilities. Some work are not designed well which are inclusive of features that are undesirable which constitute to risks that are psychosocial in nature: employees do not have control over work and their methods of work, workers cannot maximize their potentials, employees are not allowed to participate in matters pertaining to them, workers are exposed to redundant work that lead to monotony, the work performed is set with the pace of machines, demands of work are taken to be excesses, the criteria of payment is motivated b working in haste without pausing, working sessions discourage creation of free time for recreation and there is imbalance between those who put more effort and the reward of the specific tasks. As much as these risks exist there can be a reduction therapy. An individual worker should do the following reduce repetitive tasks where possible, ensuring that one is faced with logical task of mild load, ensure flow of adequate information and alerts in case of any problems, encourage teamwork, controlling and monitoring work shifts or working overtime, monitoring payment rates and provision of appropriate training to all employees in order to be equipped with all the skills needed to perform the various tasks allocated to them. 3.0. Physiological factors related to MSD These are factor that are physical and may lead to the risks of MSD. Although Physiological factors are common across the working industries and in various jobs performed, various studies have shown the statistics on reported MSD are more in prevalence in specific kind of industries and in particular occupations. In spite of inconsistencies, it is accepted generally that work that involves physical activities. Exposure of vibration to the body lead to risks that is physical in nature. Another ULD risk factor are due application of force to the extremes which can either be static or repetitive. However, if the risk influences of these factors that are in these tasks are compared with some other working group that is not exposed to the risk factors tend modest in characteristics (Bartys, 2004). MSDs and work place conditions relationship is difficult to establish because the exposure levels some times are just impossible to measure and definitions that are not clear exist for light and heavy work. In principle, improvement regulations of physical environments of work should look into reduction of levels of exposure to physical stressor that are not desirable. There has been a suggestion that the aspect of work that is tangible pose a great threat to sick workers today (Battié et al., 1998). 4.0. Relationship between Psychosocial factors and Physiological factors in the Development of MSD The main reason of discussing the relationship of the physiological factors and psychosocial factors is to try link MSD to these factors that are work related. Psychosocial factors as discussed above linked to the MSD of the shoulder, neck, back and wrist. It should be visible at the beginning, nevertheless, the relationship between psychosocial and physiological factors in all cases are always complicated and affected by many conditions. Specifically, both situational and personal characteristics may cause differences in a manner in which employees are exposed to a similar job and perception of the work environment and their reaction on situation. Current relationship of the two factors to MSDs makes a clear reflection on multi factorial and complexity of the problem nature. Generally, there are four kinds of explanation that have been borrowed to account for this relationship between psychosocial and physiological factors to MSD. The first and foremost explanation for that are demands that are psychosocial in nature may produce exacerbate work related pull and tension of the muscle. Secondly, demands that are psychosocial in nature may interfere with reporting and awareness creation of symptoms of musculoskeletal and how they perceive their cause. In the previous explanation, perverse incentive can be fit where by the society view may be to provide employees with systems that may cause an over report on MSD symptoms. The third is the original stages of pain that is caused by an insult that is physical in nature can trigger a repetitive nervous dysfunction in an individual’s system, psychological and physiological, which catalyses a persistent pain. Finally, in the situations at work, the changes in psychosocial demand are related to changes in the physical demand and stresses due to biomechanical, and hence a relationship between these factors to MSD which takes place by the means of causal or modifying effect relationship (Bartys, 2004). The evidence from research that have been reviewed from the discussion above has been divided into two sections. The first part is inclusive of neck, elbow, hand and shoulder disorders which are categorized as extreme disorders. The convention was adopted from utilization of combined symptoms by most studies related to extreme body parts like the shoulder and neck. Therefore, it isn’t probable to interview all these studies to do away with psychosocial effects under considering many areas. In the second section, back disorders are studied. Relationships that are reported under this review are substantial in almost all cases. Odd ratios have been reported where possible. In the interpretation of these studies, it is vital to be equipped with awareness. Generally, there have not been use of standardize methods of psychosocial assessment in relating to MSDs. Above that as much as psychosocial factors related to work are composed of many investigators that are similar, measurement may be done using different ways and variety of scales can be employed that differ in psychometric quality. The various methodologies employed are limited hence complicate of making conclusions that regard to literature in a summative form and in the comparison of results between what has been researched; an individual must take into account the differences. 5.0. Conclusion & Recommendations Epidemiological studies in the farthest limits suggests that various factors that are psychological like the workload, the social support at low levels and monotonous chores do associate positively with the talked about disorders. Missing control in duties the work dissatisfaction indicates Positive relation with the upper limits MSDs even though this data may not be supportive. Evidence in the connection between upper limits and the psychological factors looks stronger in the neck or shoulder abnormalities or even to the musculoskeletal signs than for hand or wrist disorders. There are a number of reasons for the relationship of the neck/shoulder disorders. These are: the big number of research carried out in Nordic countries. The studies have dealt more on neck/shoulder health outcome as compared to that of the hand/wrist; the second reason is that a lot of neck/shoulder research incorporates various psychological factors in their features, which the research on hand /wrist have not exhausted, which is a requirement. These findings may be contrasted to the research results from the heavy industrial environments, where greater exposure to the physical factors might have acted as a major role as compared to the psychological factors that helps in development of the MSDs. The third reason indicates that results from unpleasant organization or work factors might enforce a huge effect on neck/shoulder musculature. This may result in the production of increased tension in the muscles or the strain as compared to the hand/wrist locations. Factors that are associated with individual workers like the psychological status and personality or even living alone have been associated to the back pain problem and even disability. It clear however that temporal association between musculoskeletal disorders and the psychological factors remain vague. The single most obvious chance is that the psychological anguish is a consequence of the back pain. Another alternate possibility is that the psychological factors might have a bit of etiological functions in the change from employee having a back pain history to a completely unemployed individual with acute back pain. There are individual and other extra-job environment factors that may be crucial in getting to understand the factors affect the back pain development. Sometimes the limited support from the family, health locus control and social support at work may be used to assess the traits associated with these abnormalities. Prior pains of the back, dissatisfaction with the duties and distress are also significant in the multivariate analysis. As much as they are important, the variables may gave just a little reason on the reports about the back pain. The report was focused on the back pain protest and not actually on their development. Cross-sectional and the longitudinal research has proved that job dissatisfaction is related to the back disorders. Jobs might be physically demanding and therefore dissatisfaction may obviously result in the back pains as some results might show. Some research results indicate that the back pain disorders are totally not associated with the dissatisfaction at work. These findings however are limited in that they depended on the mailed questionnaires used in the survey as much as workplace factors (biochemical) were not exactly measured too. References B.H.K., B. & M., V.K., 2002. The stepped care approach to chronic back pain. Pain Research and Clinical Management , 12, pp.237-44. Bartys, S., 2004. Psychosocial factors at work, musculoskeletal disorders, and the implementation of guidelines principles. PhD Thesis. University of Huddersfield. Battié, M.C., Main, C.J. & Burton, A.K., 1998. Back pain in the workplace: implications of injury and biopsychosocial models. Boca Raton: CRC Press. Bongers, P., Kremer, A. & Ter Laak, J., 2002. Are psychosocial factors, risk factors for symptoms and signs of the shoulder. elbow, or hand/wrist?: A review of the epidemiological literature. American Journal of Industrial Medicine, 41, pp.315-42. Borg, G., 1970. Perceived exertion as an indicator of somatic stress. Scand J Rehabil Med , 2(3), pp.92-98. Buckle, P. & Devereux, J.J., 1999. Work-related neck and upper limb musculoskeletal disorders. Luxembourg: European Agency for Safety and Health at Work. Read More