Catherine Teiger

Circadian rhythms and behavior of permanent nightworkers

SummaryThis paper describes rest/activity rhythms of permanent shift workers: rotary printers. They reported during one week the hours of their sleep onset and of their meals, and their subjective appreciation of tiredness and mood. The average sleep duration (7.84 h) can be compared with that of day workers and is fairly longer than the duration of day sleep of shift workers when they are on nightshift. This long sleep can be accounted for by: (1) the early bedtime (around 05.00 h), (2) an adjustment of biological rhythms to the schedule inversion.Other evidence (naps, meal time) supports the hypothesis of a physiological adjustment. It is pointed out that this adjustment is fragile: the printers must have very rigid life habits and schedules (sleep, meals). Each time they change this strategy (especially during week-end) it is subjectively felt as detrimental.

Ergonomic Work Analysis, Training and Action: New Paths Opened by the Interconnection of Approaches

The work presented since 1991 (Paris) at the Symposiums of the IEA Congresses specialized in the theme “ Ergonomic work analysis and training” has demonstrated the main development lines of the place of training in and by work analysis in the practices and theoretical problematics of ergonomists and other work professionals. There is a progressive integration of concepts, objectives and intervention fields (training of work actors, professional training) which were distinguished in the past. New paths are opening up. In a participatory approach, these new paths are being used to organize training and action in work environments as well as individual and collective development. In particular, interdisciplinarity is helping this development while enabling ergonomists to obtain a clearer identification of their originality. The risks of the failure of an action and the conditions for its success are also being more clearly defined.

A aliança teoria / prática na obra do sociólogo do trabalho Georges Friedmann

Para que o tamanho deste comentario nao exceda (demasiado!) o do texto de Georges Friedmann (1902-1977) proposto neste numero da Laboreal, irei apenas situa-lo no seu contexto historico pessoal, academico e societal, e levantar uma das questoes de fundo que ele colocou aos seus contemporâneos. Uma questao epistemologica que se coloca ainda hoje, apesar de os contextos terem mudado bastante. Ao faze-lo, enquadro-me na reflexao do sociologo belga Mateo Alaluf (2001, p.102, traducao livre): “O r...