PhD in Occupational Safety and Health

The Ph.D. program in Occupational Safety and Health aims to create a new generation of high-level research scholars. The program aims to capitalize on the existing traditional theoretical schools in safety science while taking in account the local, cultural influences, as well as exploring emerging risks and new challenges in a National level (the discovery of hydrocarbons). The program will involve an element of theoretical reinforcement through the delivery of three high-class fundamental classes and a research part that will concentrate in the area of choice of the candidate. Students will benefit from ongoing project work in the Centre for Risk, Safety and the Environment (CERISE) with particular emphasis to the areas of safety performance and safety cultures in micro firms, human factors and safety cultures in critical infrastructures and risk communication.

Objectives & Outcomes

General Objectives

The Ph.D. program in Occupational Safety and Health aims to create a new generation of high-level research scholars. The program aims to capitalize on the existing traditional theoretical schools in safety science while taking in account the local, cultural influences, as well as exploring emerging risks and new challenges in a National level (the discovery of hydrocarbons). The program will involve an element of theoretical reinforcement through the delivery of three high-class fundamental classes and a research part that will concentrate in the area of choice of the candidate(s). Students will benefit from ongoing project work in the Centre for Risk, Safety and the Environment (CERISE) with particular emphasis to the areas of safety performance and safety cultures in micro firms, human factors and safety cultures in critical infrastructures and risk communication.

• To develop in researchers the ability to question and contest theories and concepts underpinning occupational safety and health;
• To armor students with methodological as well as theoretical tools that will enable them to develop new knowledge and expand the frontiers of safety science;
• To provide a thorough background on the mainstream, traditional as well as developing theories in health and safety management;
• To ensure that researchers understand the locus of OHS within Enterprise Risk Management and Corporate Governance and the need to integrate the management of safety and health into all levels of responsibility in an undertaking;
• To ensure that students understand the need to approach occupational safety and health risks primarily through the use of preventative means

Specific Objectives

The specific objectives of the Ph.D. in Occupational Safety and Health program are:

• To prepare a small, select group of exceptional students to hold university faculty positions or conduct original research in the corporate or public sectors, or get high-level positions in industry.
• To help students acquire critical appraisal of the concepts and theories that underline the nature and practice of safety science and the extension of the processes of inquiry (problem-solving, critical thinking and research) for the development and testing of knowledge.
• To explore the boundaries of knowledge in safety science with particular emphasis on local and cultural influences (e.g. micro firms, family businesses, hydrocarbons etc)
• To provide students with the learning foundations for the continuing evolution of new knowledge in safety science.
• To empower research students with skills that will allow them to become experts in their chosen area of safety science.
• To foster and nurture the diverse and varying educational, personal, and cultural backgrounds and experiences of students in an educational environment that encourages and promotes the free interchange among scholars and between teachers and students