The ordering of safety warnings in product manuals

There has only been limited research on how to order the multi-hazard warnings in product manuals. The present study examines this aspect using warning statements from manuals of three power tools having multiple hazards associated with their use, maintenance, and storage. This research also examines the relationship between the mean rank ordering and several user belief dimensions. One group of 25 participants rank ordered each set of warning statements based on how they believed the warnings should be listed in the manuals. Another group of 25 participants rated each warning statement on importance, injury severity, injury likelihood, and prior awareness. The results provided numerical orderings of the statements that could be useful in assembling warning lists in manuals. Three of the four belief dimensions had substantial negative correlations with mean rank; the fourth, awareness, showed a much weaker relationship. This research demonstrates that assessment of warning-statement orders might be useful in constructing operator manuals that better communicate product-related hazards.