Over the past 20 years, there has been much discussion of improving the “safety culture” in academia, but this paper will look at the larger picture of safety as a social construct. Societies are groups of people sharing a common culture (knowledge, beliefs, and values) over time. People in a society generate ideas (cultural) that can compete with currently accepted shared knowledge (social). If the evidence presented convinces others in the society to modify their constructs (family, education, politics) then a paradigm shift occurs. To manage chemical safety as a social construct, one must look at the way individuals interact within their social realm and develop an accepted “theory” embraced by all.

Managing chemical safety as a social construct: A paradigm shift in chemistry

2019 Spring National Meeting

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