People of any age, including young people, bring to their job their own personal mix of physical characteristics, knowledge and skills, attitudes, habits and personality, any or all of which may be strengths or weaknesses depending on the task demands. These individual characteristics influence behaviour in complex and significant ways, and it is important,
therefore, that individuals are appointed to jobs and roles to which they are individually suited. Some of these characteristics are fixed and cannot be changed, or at least not easily or in the short term, e.g. physical characteristics and personality. Others, though, may be altered, adapted and enhanced through learning. This applies to an individual’s knowledge and skills, attitudes and habits – all attributes that contribute significantly to competence in the job or role. People can, therefore, be developed in their jobs to become more effective. This is likely to be especially true of young persons, who are unlikely to have the experience and maturity of outlook than an employer would expect from an older worker.
Accident rates tend to vary with the experience of operatives – the more experienced the employee, the better the safety record. This is not hard to understand, since with experience should come a better understanding of risks and greater appreciation of safety measures. This points to a need for good induction procedures when new and young entrants are introduced to a workplace.
Note, though, that it is experience, which is the key, not necessarily age. Young persons, perhaps starting work for the first time, are obviously the most inexperienced, but older people starting work in a new environment are also likely to lack understanding of the particular risks associated with that environment. In addition, younger workers are not as susceptible to death or permanent disablement due to injury at work as older workers are, perhaps due to their greater agility (both physical and mental).
Aptitude refers to an individual’s ability in respect of something – their knowledge and skills, and general ease of learning and understanding, about it.
People have different aptitudes. For example, some people have an aptitude for using computers or for manipulating numbers or for using words effectively, whilst others do not seem to have these abilities. Whilst it is undoubtedly possible for everyone to learn them, it appears that certain skills come more easily to some people than others do. It is likely, therefore, that although there may well be certain skills that young persons may find difficult to learn/absorb due to their experience and lack of maturity, there may well be others (e.g. motor skills, computer skills, etc.) which a young person will master more quickly than an older recruit.
All jobs require a certain level of mental and social skills. There will be large individual differences in the psychological capacity of young persons, based on differences in their training, experience, skills, personality and attitudes. However, there are some areas of work that could be beyond a young person’s mental and emotional coping ability, such as dealing with violent and aggressive behaviour, and decision-making in stressful situations. For example, in a situation where an accident has occurred and a person injured, due to his/her inexperience/immaturity a young person may panic or make the wrong decision when not in full control of all the relevant facts. A lack of training in a particular aspect of the use of a
machine/the operation of certain equipment, etc. can also cause problems and mistakes may be easily made.
Furthermore the influence of peer group pressure could lead to children and young persons being influenced in their attitude/approach to their work. Individuals are employed by
organisations, but in the work situation individuals invariably work together in groups. Even if the work does not require people to work together in this way, individuals establish informal social relationships with the other people they come into contact with in the work situation (their peers). The influence of groups on the behaviour of individuals, and how they relate to the organisation as a whole, has been the subject of a great deal of research and writing by management experts over many years.
All groups, whether they are formal work groups within the organisation or informal groups (e.g. a group of friends who go out for a drink every week after work), establish a pattern of attitudes, behaviours, values and beliefs, etc. – known as group norms – to which members are expected to conform. The pressure to conform can be very strong and comes from the need for approval and acceptance (and the converse needs to avoid disapproval and rejection). Thus, these norms are immensely powerful influences on behaviour.
Group norms develop through the informal processes of social interaction to support the shared goals of the members of the group. Even within formal work groups, these goals may not necessarily coincide with the organisation’s goals for the group – they are likely to include the organisation’s formal goals, but may well extend beyond those into meeting other needs. For example, a particular group within an office may be quite happy to meet whatever production targets are given them, but always organise their work to enable them to finish early on a Friday so they can go for a drink together. In order for the organisation's own values and expected behaviours to be adopted by the group, they must be accepted as appropriate to the needs of the group.
This has considerable implications for health and safety in that it would appear that, in order for individuals to conform to the organisation’s policy and practices, these policies and practices have to be accepted as part of the norms of the groups to which they belong. If these norms are oriented in favour of encouraging good health and safety practices in the workplace, an individual within that group will normally react or respond by accepting those same values. However, if the group norms dictate that, for example, wearing protective clothing or following safety codes is silly, individuals will be reluctant to conform to the organisation’s policy, or if they do, may seek to find ways around it. Young persons are particularly vulnerable to such peer group influences since they are likely to be impressionable and to lack the maturity and confidence to stand up to peer group pressure.
It is therefore vital that employers particularly assess the risks to young and inexperienced workers.
With increasing experience we would expect an employee to become more competent at their job and to have developed an ability to cope with issues such as health and safety. However, there is also the risk of complacency and a tendency to cut corners may become apparent. Age and experience are correlated with differences in accident susceptibility as the graph below indicates. Though its exact shape will vary with circumstances, the curve will remain roughly the same, with the greatest susceptibility to accidents occurring with lack of experience and in the younger age groups.
Accident Susceptibility in Relation to Age and Experience