Health and well-being in construction

Overview:

The relationship between workers’ health and the work environment is complex, as several personal and work-related factors could affect their health and well-being. There is a growing recognition that construction work and the workplace could significantly impact construction workers’ health and well-being. Construction workers are often associated with higher rates of diseases and poor health conditions than workers in other sectors. Unhealthy habits and lifestyles such as harmful alcohol consumption, substance abuse, smoking, and the prevalence of obesity, stress and cardiovascular diseases among construction workers at higher rates than the general population are significant concerns. Poor health conditions cause physical and mental suffering to individuals and their families and inflict considerable financial burdens on individuals, organisations, society and the government.

However, despite its importance, less attention has been paid to research on the health and well-being of construction workers and professionals compared to their safety. Specifically, the current trends in adopting advanced technologies and innovations in construction have posed some emerging hazards that need more attention from construction safety and health researchers and scholars. For instance, how new technologies (e.g., construction 4.0) and changes in work practices (e.g., offsite construction or remote working) affect the health and well-being of the construction workforce (e.g., technostress or poor work-life balance) is not well understood. Additionally, the poor mental health of construction workers and professionals has become an alarming issue worldwide that demands more research, especially the design and implementation of mental health promotion programs and other interventions. 

The special issue aims to fill these critical gaps by encouraging more research on this crucial topic. It seeks to draw attention to health and well-being issues that construction workers and professionals face due to working in an unpredictable, physically demanding and stressful work environment and how different stakeholders could collaborate to promote health and well-being in construction. 

Authors are invited to submit manuscripts aiming at various topics related to health and well-being in construction, including but not limited to the following themes:
1.    Innovations in the management of health (physical or psychological or both) and well-being in the construction industry
2.    Prevention-through-Design (PtD) with a focus on health hazards
3.    Critical reviews of health and well-being policies/strategies/measures at the levels of industry, organisation, and project
4.    Applications of emerging technologies and management strategies to improve health and well-being in construction (e.g., health monitoring technologies, mental health interventions)
5.    Implications of construction 4.0 and emerging technologies for health and well-being (e.g., technostress, poor work-life balance) in construction
6.    Health and well-being of minority groups such as women, apprentices, and migrant construction workers and professionals
7.    Health and well-being of younger, aging, and older workers
8.    Case studies on health and well-being promotion programs in construction
9.    Factors influencing the health and well-being of construction workers and professionals

Submission Information:

Expressions of interest and submissions of abstracts can be sent to the Guest Editors ahead of submission. 

Submission deadline: 31 August 2023

Please submit papers using the ScholarOne submission system: https://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/ciipm and indicate that your submission is for this special edition.

Please refer to the journal's Author Guidelines.

Guest Editors:

Dr Abid Hasan, Deakin University, Australia. [email protected]

Associate Professor Riza Yosia Sunindijo, University of New South Wales, Australia. [email protected]

Dr Babak Memarian, CPWR – The Center for Construction Research and Training, United States. [email protected]

Associate Professor Sheila Belayutham, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Malaysia. [email protected]