Using Augmented Reality (AR) in Vocational Education Programs to Teach Occupational Health and Safety (OHS)

Oct 15, 2026

Upload by nayy☆

Design of an Augmented Reality (AR) based awareness system for vocational education students in occupational health and safety (OHS). The AR interface warns learners during task performance by projecting cues onto work-force surfaces, repeating alerts to help students recognize risky actions, improve caution, and reduce errors. The study combines literature review with two controlled experiments at Çınarlı Vocational and Technical High School and Dokuz Eylül University Mechanical Engineering. Results indicate fewer mistakes and a potential reduction in occupational accidents, deaths, and financial loss.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryHealthcare

FormatPDF

Pages14

Reading Time35 min

AccessFree to download

Introduction

Methods and Research Questions

Significance of the Study

Limitations of the Study

Using augmented reality (AR) in vocational education programs to teach occupational health and safety (OHS) Renk Hülagü, Izmir Institute of Technology, Turkey Önder Erkarslan, Izmir Institute of Technology, Turkey Abstract The aim of this research is to design a system that will raise awareness among vocational education students about occupational health and safety and the integration of Augmented Reality (AR) systems into the application/concept. Simply, projected on the work force surface, the AR system warns the students as they perform actions that pose a risk, need caution and may result in accidents. Therefore, by repetitive warnings, students learn the faultiness of actions in a faster pace and develop and insightful awareness. The research involves a literature review and two experiments studies in Çınarlı Vocational and Technical High School (CVHS) with high school and Dokuz Eylül University Mechanical Engineering (DEU ME) students. A system is designed according to the findings from these studies. As a result, students learnt tobe more cautious, and the number of mistakes they make decreased. This will result in decrease in the number of occupational accidents, deaths and financial loss. The project presents an innovative method applicable both to the industry and the training a qualified workforce. Keywords OHS training Vocational Education, Augmented Reality, Occupational Health and Safety, Education, Machining Introduction The problem that is stated in this paper tackles with the lack of courses and inability of the teaching of occupational health and safety (OHS) for vocational and industrial education. The great efforts of keeping the occupational health and safety standards high also makes the subject harder to teach. Without exposure to risky or dangerous situations, the workers may develop a false belief of being safe without precautions. Especially the inexperienced workers get injured more often. Otherwise, the worker becomes experienced and starts working as a form of a reflex, which may result in the false belief of being safe without the precautions. Although it is true that the inexperienced ones are the most likely to be involved in work accidents, experienced workers also make mistakes that result in injuries, or even death. Both employers and employees see OHS as a burden. Employers consider it a financial burden and time consuming because of all the inspections and training. The employees consider personal protective equipment needed makes them incapable of moving freely and consider training is not necessary. This research has been undertaken to understand the effect of a fairly new technology on OHStraining. The research phases are: • Creating a guideline for industrial designers to start their research on OHS and augmented reality (AR) systems. • Designing an education system to teach occupational health and safety in vocational schools. • Creating a discussion on OHS and what can be accomplished about it. • Understanding the effect of AR systems in the field of education. Methods and Research Questions This research consists of two parts; a preliminary study to understand the problem and its approximate solutions; secondly, a main study, the experiment of the developed system in vocational education. The main study had a systematic data collection and analysis, which made it available to be analyzed as both qualitative and quantitative research. The study’s experimental and comparative data was examined with quantitative methods. This experiment was a controlled field experiment with between-subjects design. Controlled experiments have control and test groups to find out the effect of the independent variable. Field experiments are experiments conducted in the field the person lives/studies/works in, in this case the educational field, vocational school. Between-subjects design is about changing one condition of the independent variable at a time. In the first

FAQs

What problem does the research address in OHS education for vocational training?

It targets the lack of effective OHS courses and limited exposure to risky or dangerous situations, which can lead learners and workers to develop false beliefs about being safe.

How does the proposed AR system support OHS training?

The system projects AR warnings onto the work surface, alerting students while they perform actions that pose risks, encouraging caution through repeated prompts.

What research design and questions were used to evaluate effectiveness?

The study uses a controlled field experiment with a between-subjects design and asks whether AR is effective for OHS training and whether a safer operating system can be designed for existing machines.

Oct 15, 2026

Upload by nayy☆