Occupational Health Discourses about the Role of Power
For the past fifty years, research and practice on working conditions has sought to limit exposure to hazardous circumstances in “dirty, dangerous, and demeaning jobs,” many of which are essential to the functioning of our society. While occupational fatalities and injuries have dropped dramatically across the US, work is also implicated in the development and evolution of multiple chronic diseases. Furthermore, in recent decades, changes in labor markets and societies have prompted additional consideration of how work interacts with health, which has expanded researcher attention to include the employee-employer relationship and the employment conditions established with that relationship as health influences.
This project is a scoping literature review that seeks to characterize the discourses used in occupational health research, or, to put it simply, the way that we think and write about occupational health research. This discourse has shaped research of all types and means, including exposure assessment (e.g. recognition that different working populations may be at higher risk of certain chemical or physical exposures), interventions (e.g. certain workers may not feel empowered to draw attention to safety violations), and translation (e.g., assessing how a mitigation may be experienced by different occupational populations), among others. Furthermore, recent changes to occupational health discourses brought on by initiatives such as Total Worker Health® have introduced myriad key words, concepts, and disciplinary perspectives to the field that are not always well-understood. Characterizing the discourses in occupational health can explore pervasive values that shape research, policy, and interventions and identify how and why historical norms, practices, and processes have evolved over time. By characterizing the discourse, we can also have real, measurable impact in shaping academic and continuing education, prioritizing elements of professional practice, and taking actions for change.