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Working life division

The activities of the working life division focus on the analysis of real human activity at work for occupational health and safety purposes. They concern physiological and psychological stress and strains, organizational aspects of work and prevention and are based on companies’ practices and on laboratory experiments.

Preventive Ergonomics and Occupational Psychology Lab

The laboratory's main mission is to analyze the real activities of operators in a dynamic work context, characterized by organizational, technological and demographic changes. It aims at producing knowledge, transforming work situations and developing guidelines for prevention specialists.
The 12 researchers of the laboratory use theoretical methods and models from psychology and ergonomics.
The laboratory's unifying element consists mainly of research-interventions performed on real work situations with the help of companies. It focuses on the analysis of work activities and the workers' experience. We also use researchers also use questionnaire surveys or laboratory experiments.
Ongoing studies and research focus on technological and organizational developments and their relationship with staff health and safety. Among the various themes currently being addressed we find: psychosocial risks, well-being at work, the impact of new technologies on the activity and health of operators, the effects of forms of subcontracting for maintenance activities, acceptability of new technologies, human/robot interaction, keeping a job in a context of ageing, managers' ability to prevent risks for their teams’ members of in a context of overload, etc

© Philippe Castano for INRS

Publications

  • Judon, N., Galey, L., Saint-Dizier de Almeida, V, Garrigou, A (2020). Contributions of participatory ergonomics to the involvement of workers in chemical risk prevention projects. WORK: A Journal of Prevention, Assessment and Rehabilitation. vol. 64, no. 3, pp. 651-660
  • Atain-Kouadio, J.J., Kerangueven, L., Turpin-Legendre, E., Theurel, J. (2019). Consensus on testing and evaluation of occupational exoskeletons in the workplace, for a better integration. Communication at PREMUS 2019, Bologna, 2-5 september 2019
  • Cuny-Guerrier, A., Savescu, A., Tappin, D. (2019) Strategies to commit senior subcontractor managers in participatory ergonomics interventions, Applied Ergonomics, Vol 81, 102878
  • Wioland, L., Govaere, V (2018). Definition of an occupational risk prevention approach for networked organizations: the case of road freight transport and logistics. Communication at the XXth IEA Congress (INTERNATIONAL ERGONOMICS ASSOCIATION), Florence (Italy), 26-30 August 2018.
  • Andersen, L.L., Fishwick, D., Robinson, E., Wiezer, N., Mockallo, Z., Grosjean, V. (2017). Job satisfaction is more than a fruit basket, health checks and free
  • exercise: Cross-sectional sectional study among 10,000 wage earners. Scandinavian Journal of Public Health, 45(5):476-484
  • Grosjean, V. (2017). Overconnected or disconnected in the digital age? Ideal Types of relationship to email overuse amongst a population of occupational health practitioners. Communication at WORKS2017 “Work and Labour in the Digital Future”, Turku, 7-8 August 2017
  • Van de Weerdt (2016). Analysis of activity and emotions: a case study based investigation of an evolving method. Le travail humain 2016/1 (Vol. 79), p. 31-52
  • Grusenmeyer C. (2014) Maintenance organizational modes, activities and health & safety. Exploitation of a French National Survey and in-situ analyses. Accident Analysis and Prevention, Vol. 73, pp. 187-199.
  • Wioland, L., Govaere, V. (2014). Comparative study of two organizations using information and communication technology: effects on the health of operators in the road haulage. Journal of Traffic and Logistics Engineering, March 2014, Vol. 2, Issue 1, pp. 66-70.

Occupational Safety and Health Management Lab

The laboratory brings together researchers in the humanities and social sciences and develops research on the actors, tools and practices of prevention.
Prevention is a strategic and managerial subject which is constantly renewed as companies and society change. In this context, the laboratory studies the appropriation and use of knowledge and tools that participate in prevention, by the various stakeholders inside and outside the company. The research is organized around two complementary axes, one centered on the analysis of practices, and the other on the transformation of these practices in the service of prevention.
Rooted historically on questions of accidentology methods and activity analysis, the work today focuses on occupational health and safety management standards, practices and tools, risk representations, occupational health/overall performance links, new forms of work and employment, healthy ageing throughout the working life and / or within the context of organizational transformation projects.

© Gael Kerbaol - INRS

Publications

  • Quillerou, E. & Lux A. (2019). "Orchestrating" methodology for designing an Industrial System that improves Occupational Health and Safety. Human Systems Integration Conference (HSI2019). Biarritz, France, September 11-13th, 2019. https://www.incose.org/hsi2019
  • Morvan, E., Buchmann W.(2018). What becomes of lean manufacturing after it is implemented? A longitudinal analysis in 2 French multinational companies - Proceedings of the 20th Congress of the International Ergonomics Association (IEA 2018), Volume VIII: Ergonomics and Human Factors in Manufacturing, Agriculture, Building and Construction, Sustainable Development and Mining, p. 940-949
  • Kloetzer, L., Quillerou-Grivot, E. & Simonet, P. (2015). Engaging workers in MSD Prevention: two interdisciplinary case studies in an Activity Clinic. Work, 51, 2, p.161-173.

Physiology, Movement and Work

The laboratory consists of biomechanicians, engineers, physicians and physiologists. The main activities concern:

  • musculoskeletal disorders, low back pain,
  • ageing at work, staying at work,
  • occupational accidents with movement disturbance,
  • sedentary behaviour, VDU work
  • physical assistance robots, exoskeletons

They are structured around :

  • physical strains with damaging health effects, including cardio-respiratory, thermal, muscular or postural constraints,
  • movement through its understanding, characterization and determinants. The aim being to prevent damage to the musculoskeletal system through the study of risk factors and the development of prevention methods and tools.

The laboratory carries out its various activities in real work situations and in the laboratory. The means used are both objective (heart rate monitoring, electromyography, kinetic and kinematic analysis of movement, actimetry, force measurements, functional capacity evaluation, etc.) and subjective (observations, interviews, questionnaires, evaluation scales, etc.).
The laboratory promotes its work through publications, brochures as well as participation in prevention and training activities and in national and international working groups (PEROSH network, standardisation, etc.).

 

© Guillaume J. Plisson for INRS

Publications

  • Gaudez C, Wild P, Gilles MA, Savin J, Claudon L, Bailleul D. Study of between-subject and within-subject variability of electromyography data and its intrinsic determinants for clip fitting tasks. International journal of occupational safety and ergonomics : JOSE,  2019, 1-36.
  • Theurel J & Desbrosses K (2019) Occupational exoskeletons: overview of their benefits and limitations in preventing work-related musculoskeletal disorders. IISE Transactions on Occupational Ergonomics and Human Factors
  • Gilles, M.A., Wild, P., 2018. Grasping an object at floor-level: Is movement strategy a matter of age? Applied ergonomics 70, 34-43.
  • Savescu, A., Cuny-Guerrier, A., Wild, P., Reno, G., Aublet-Cuvelier, A., & Claudon, L. Objective assessment of knife sharpness over a working day cutting meat. Applied Ergonomics, 2018, 68, 109-116.
  • Theurel J., Desbrosses K.Roux T., Savescu A. Physiological consequences of using an upper limb exoskeleton during manual handling tasks. Applied Ergonomics, 2018, 211-217.
  • Gilles, M.A., Guelin, J.C., Desbrosses, K., Wild, P., 2017. Motor adaptation capacity as a function of age in carrying out a repetitive assembly task at imposed work paces. Applied Ergonomics 64, 47-55.
  • Holtermann A, Schellewald V, Mathiassen SE, Gupta N, Pinder A, Punakallio A, Veiersted KB, Weber B, Takala EP, Draicchio F, Enquist H, Desbrosses K, Sanz MPG, Malinska M, Villar M, Wichtl M, Strebl M, Forsman M, Lusa S, Tokarski T, Hendriksen P, Ellegast R. A practical guidance for assessments of sedentary behavior at work: A PEROSH initiative. Applied Ergonomics, 2017, 63: 41-52
  • Hua Y., Lermerle P., Ganghoffer J.F., A two scale modeling and and computational framework for vibration-induced Raynaud syndrome. Journal of the mechanical behavior of biomedical materials, vol. 71, 2017, 320-328.
  • Gaudez C, Gilles MA, Savin J. Intrinsic movement variability at work. How long is the path from motor control to design engineering? Applied Ergonomics 2016, 53, 71-8.
  • Gaudez C, Cail F. Effects of mouse slant and desktop position on muscular and postural stresses, subject preference and performance in women aged 18-40 years. Ergonomics. 2016, 59(11), 1473-86
  • B. Bouvier, S. Duprey, L. Claudon, R. Dumas and A. Savescu. Upper limb kinematics using inertial and magnetic sensors: comparison of sensor-to-segment calibrations. Sensors, 2015, 15, 18813-18833
  • Gaudez C, Wild P, Aublet-Cuvelier A. A better way of fitting clips? A comparative study with respect to physical workload. Applied Ergonomics 2015, 51, 236-43.

Development and technical support unit

The development and technical support unit contributes to the design and implementation of methods and tools to evaluate, measure and analyse many components of the work activity, in collaboration with the three laboratories of Working life division. This unit uses a variety of skills (electronics, computing, statistics, mechanics, video, 3D modelling and printing, etc.) to meet the technical needs of research, to contribute to the development of new technologies and to the collection and processing of data. It also ensures a technological watch in order to acquire the most efficient tools to meet the needs of research in occupational health and safety.
The development and technical support unit’s activities are deployed both in experimental laboratory conditions and during interventions in companies.

 

© Patrick Delapierre for INRS

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Last update on 09/07/2021
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