Safety implications of the neuroscience of plasticity and the work athlete

Hilarious, if it weren’t so poignant, article by John Culvenor on his Safe Design Blog. See also Rob Long’s latest article: Safety Futurism

Safety implications of the neuroscience of plasticity and the work athlete: Abstract of a keynote address on safety leadership cultural change science*

Leadership in occupational health and safety will only be achieved by adopting the latest research about human performance. Science has recently emerged that the brain is plastic in nature. Vital new imperatives emerge for occupational health and safety. The importance of fitness and exercise on peak performance in occupational health and safety has not been well understood until now. It relates not only to the well-being of the physical body to the functioning of the brain. We know that everything needed to be known about the performance of any work can be learnt by studying athletics. All people doing athletics get hot when they are performing. We know that. It’s not new. But what it means for thinking, cognition, creativity in business, and safety-critical decision-making in human error has not been realized. Unfortunately many people involved in intellectual work where decision-making accuracy is vital are kept cool by air conditioning and/or low metabolic demands. The disadvantage of this is that the plastic in the brain becomes hard. Exercise will help heat the brain, increasing the plasticity, and allowing ideas to flow more easily. This is why executive fitness is vital. This is also true in decision-critical high-demand tasks in surgery, transport, heavy engineering, mining, etc and means we need a new term “work-athlete”. It is known by the science of accident analysis that human error sometimes occurs in cool conditions. It explains for instance higher accident rates at night. This is now known to be because the plastic of the brain goes too hard blocking cognition. To overcome this it is vital to introduce exercise and fitness programs. However performance can only be maintained by using a Brain Energy Activation Neuron Intelligence Enhancer (BEANIE^TM). The BEANIE^TM functions to retain the heat of exercise during executive decision-making ensuring that heat and the effects of plastic brain fluidity is maintained. BEANIEs^TM also come in the colours of your favourite sports team.

*Not really

See the whole article here

What Makes a Safety Management System Fly
Imagination and Safety
What is Safety?
Deconstructing Safety and Humans
Do Scare Tactics Work?
“Neuroscience for a New Age: How Brain Science Will Shape Our Future”

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Dr Rob Long

Expert in Social Psychology, Principal & Trainer at Human Dymensions

Latest posts by Dr Rob Long (see all)

Not Just Another ‘Hazard’ - February 3, 2023
How to Be Oriented Towards Psychosocial and Mental Health in Safety - February 2, 2023
Free Download – Real Risk – New Book by Dr Robert Long - February 2, 2023
ISO 45003 and What it Cannot Do - February 1, 2023
Harming People in the Name of Good - January 31, 2023

PhD., MEd., MOH., BEd., BTh., Dip T., Dip Min., Cert IV TAA, MRMIA Rob is the founder of Human Dymensions and has extensive experience, qualifications and expertise across a range of sectors including government, education, corporate, industry and community sectors over 30 years. Rob has worked at all levels of the education and training sector including serving on various post graduate executive, post graduate supervision, post graduate course design and implementation programs.