The prediction of workers’ food safety intentions and behavior with job attitudes and the reasoned action approach11Notes.Portions of the larger data set from the survey concerned with conscientious personality and an organizational climate of food safety were published in a chapter (Nickell & Hinsz, 2011) and another segment related to regulatory focus and regulatory fit notions was published in Park et al. (In press) but both are independent of the arguments presented in this paper.

AbstractThe production of safe food is an important objective for many food-processing facilities given the health and organizational costs of food contamination. This investigation examines how reasoned action and job attitudes approaches can predict factors that contribute to the production of safe food. The reasoned action approach suggests these behaviors are predicted by perceived behavioral control and intentions to engage in food safety behaviors, and that these intentions are anticipated by attitudes regarding the behaviors and perceived social norms to engage in food safety behaviors. The job attitudes approach examined how job satisfaction, job involvement, and organizational commitment could predict worker's self-reported efforts to provide safe food. A survey of workers at a poultry producing facility indicates that the job attitudes and the reasoned action variables were all predictive of food safety behaviors, however, further analyses indicate that workers’ reports of their food safety intentions and behaviors were best predicted by the reasoned action approach with job attitudes failing to add to the prediction of food safety. Implications for other behaviors involving safety and security are discussed