Introduction: Previous research has shown that employees who experience high job demands are more inclined
to show unsafe behaviors in the workplace. In this paper, we examine why some employees behave safely when
faced with these demands while others do not. We add to the literature by incorporating both physical and psychosocial
safety climate in the job demands and resources (JD-R) model and extending it to include physical and
psychosocial variants of safety behavior. Method: Using a sample of 6230 health care employees nested within
52 organizations, we examined the relationship between job demands and (a) resources, (b) safety climate,
and (c) safety behavior. We conducted multilevel analyses to test our hypotheses. Results: Job demands
(i.e., work pressure), job resources (i.e., job autonomy, supervisor support, and co-worker support) and safety climate
(both physical and psychosocial safety climate) are directly associated with, respectively, lower and higher
physical and psychosocial safety behavior. We also found some evidence that safety climate buffers the negative
impact of job demands (i.e., work–family conflict and job insecurity) on safety behavior and strengthens the
positive impact of job resources (i.e., co-worker support) on safety behavior. Conclusions: Regardless of whether
the focus is physical or psychological safety, our results show that strengthening the safety climate within an
organization can increase employees' safety behavior. Practical implication: An organization's safety climate is
an optimal target of intervention to prevent and ameliorate negative physical and psychological health and safety
outcomes, especially in times of uncertainty and change.
© 2015 National Safety Council a