Application of Q-methodology in studying construction stakeholders' perceptions of OSH risks - An introduction to the preliminary stage

There is increasing recognition that many construction occupational health and safety (OSH) hazards arise as a result of activities in the planning and design stage. Improvement of construction OSH performance can be influenced by various stakeholder groups, not just the appointed construction contractor. It is important for stakeholder groups to take each other's perspective when considering OSH risks. However, different stakeholder groups may have different perceptions of OSH risk, leading to difficulty in establishing a common strategy to eliminate hazards and/or and reduce risk. This study aims to map the similarity/difference between stakeholder groups' OSH risk perceptions. An innovative Q-methodology is adopted for data collection. Q-methodology involves a number of procedures by which respondents sort a set of sample objects (known as a Q-set) into certain order, according to their subjective judgements. Photographs will be used as stimuli for the Q-sort in this study. This paper introduces the rationale of Q-methodology, and describes the process of developing and validating the Q-sort instrument for this construction application.