Does fatigue mediate the relation between physical isolation and safety behaviour among isolated oil and gas workers?

•Social isolation has negative influence on both types of safety behaviour.•Loneliness has negative influence on both types of safety behaviour.•Mental fatigue mediated the relationship between loneliness and safety behaviour.•Social isolation did not predict safety behaviour through fatigue levels. Fatigue is lethargy and seen as unpleasant experience that occurs from physical labour or mental exertion. Fatigue can be either physical or mental. This paper examines the role of physical fatigue and mental fatigue in the relationship between physical isolation variables (social isolation and loneliness) and safety behaviour (safety compliance and safety participation). A cross-sectional study with data were collected by means of a questionnaire among oil and gas workers (foreign employees working at a remote oil and gas field site located in Kuwait), during a 3-month period (from October 2018 to December 2018). Regression analyses (bivariate and hierarchical), carried out on 387 responses, were employed to test the hypothesized model relating physical isolation variables, fatigue levels, and safety behaviour. The results provide support for the role of mental fatigue in mediating the relationship between loneliness and both types of safety behaviour (compliance and participation). Results indicate that mental fatigue is associated with feeling lonely and has negative effect on safety behaviour, which indicated a greater risk of injury incident rates. The study findings should facilitate the improvement of employee safe behaviour through monitoring workers’ fatigue levels. Moreover, they may enable prompt intervention and help to contribute to the development of recommendations that broaden our understanding of the effects of isolation and remote work in the context of workplace safety. The implications of these results for physical isolation, fatigue and/or safety behaviour interventions in the industry are discussed.