Research and industry practice emphasize the usefulness of personality-based assessment, particularly
measures of conscientiousness, for predicting workplace rule compliance and safety behavior. However,
recent research suggests that it may also be valuable to consider potential moderators of the personality
– safety relationship. Accordingly, this study uses a field sample (N = 219) to examine the degree to which
cognitive ability moderates conscientiousness when predicting workplace safety behavior. As hypothesized,
we found that those individuals with higher levels of cognitive ability were more likely to demonstrate
higher safety behavior regardless of level of conscientiousness. In contrast, conscientiousness was a
stronger predictor of safety behavior for individuals with lower levels of cognitive ability. Implications for
understanding the way cognitive ability and conscientiousness interact are discussed.