Hesitance to Change Behaviour: Key Factors of Construction Foreign Workers' Safety Non-Compliances

Foreign workers served to alleviate the labour shortage in the Malaysian construction industry. High dependence on their workforce has elevated negative impacts on the social and behavioural perspective. Nevertheless, cultural and behavioural differences have appeared as the primary sources of their unwillingness to practise proper safety procedures. This study aims to explore the key factors of construction foreign workers’ safety non-compliance in the workplace. This research was conducted via a qualitative approach through semi-structured interviews with nine (9) selected informants who are working closely with foreign workers at the operational level. Thematic analysis was adopted in this research to analyse the responses by familiarising the data coded and identifying the main factors and the sub-factors. The result shows that ignorance, negligence, overlooked, over-confidence and misconception are the five (5) key factors of construction foreign workers’ safety non-compliance in Malaysian construction sites. The factors are similar and capable of extending the Resisting to Change theory’s original components Therefore, if these elements are thoroughly evaluated, it is possible to attain a high degree of safety compliance among foreign workers