A survey of swine caretakers suggests a variety of factors play a role in the consistency of compliance with day-to-day biosecurity protocols.
A study funded through the Swine Health Information Center Wean-to-Harvest Biosecurity Research Program, in partnership with the Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research and Pork Checkoff, conducted by Talent Metrics Consulting examined the motivation of swine caretakers related to compliance with biosecurity.
SHIC Associate Director Dr. Lisa Becton says 139 swine caretakers from across five different production companies were surveyed over one year.
This survey was developed to understand personnel behaviors and on the job motivations and thought process when they’re doing their day-to-day jobs. Some of the studied factors which might impact compliance to biosecurity include attitudes on the farm, social norms, what are perceived behavioral controls, what is behavioral intent, job demand, job resources, the level of tiredness or exhaustion for completing a job and even looking at disengagement from work.
The findings suggested that industry, when we look at biosecurity compliance, is not completely driven by issues for motivation. What does that mean? It means that there could be further investigation into what are the rewards that could help motivate workers. Some things, like additional supervisor support, potential use of performance feedback, all of these things could be looked at. How do you continue to educate and motivate people to do these tasks day in and day out.
Again, the biggest thing to identify was looking at how can different producers, supervisors etcetera reward personnel behavior to gain better biosecurity compliance.
~ Dr. Lisa Becton, Swine Health Information Center
Details of the survey can be accessed through the Swine Health Information Center web site at swinehealth.org.
