[Federal Register Volume 83, Number 236 (Monday, December 10, 2018)]
[Notices]
[Pages 63509-63510]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2018-26636]


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DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

[60Day-19-19BX; Docket No. CDC-2018-0107]


Proposed Data Collection Submitted for Public Comment and 
Recommendations

AGENCY: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Department of 
Health and Human Services (HHS).

ACTION: Notice with comment period.

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SUMMARY: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), as part 
of its continuing effort to reduce public burden and maximize the 
utility of government information, invites the general public and other 
Federal agencies the opportunity to comment on a proposed and/or 
continuing information collection, as required by the Paperwork 
Reduction Act of 1995. This notice invites comment on a proposed 
information collection project titled Understanding How Discounting 
Affects Decision Making and Adoption of Prevention Through Design 
Solutions. The goal of this information collection is to understand the 
social and organizational factors that may increase or decrease the 
adoption of practices that keep workers safe.

DATES: CDC must receive written comments on or before February 8, 2019.

ADDRESSES: You may submit comments, identified by Docket No. CDC-2018-
0107 by any of the following methods:
     Federal eRulemaking Portal: Regulations.gov. Follow the 
instructions for submitting comments.
     Mail: Jeffrey M. Zirger, Information Collection Review 
Office, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 1600 Clifton Road 
NE, MS-D74, Atlanta, Georgia 30329.
    Instructions: All submissions received must include the agency name 
and Docket Number. CDC will post, without change, all relevant comments 
to Regulations.gov.
    Please note: Submit all Federal comments through the Federal 
eRulemaking portal (regulations.gov) or by U.S. mail to the address 
listed above.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: To request more information on the 
proposed project or to obtain a copy of the information collection plan 
and instruments, contact Jeffrey M. Zirger, Information Collection 
Review Office, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 1600 Clifton 
Road NE, MS-D74, Atlanta, Georgia 30329; phone: 404-639-7570; Email: 
[email protected].

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Under the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 
(PRA) (44 U.S.C. 3501-3520), Federal agencies must obtain approval from 
the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for each collection of 
information they conduct or sponsor. In addition, the PRA also requires 
Federal agencies to provide a 60-day notice in the Federal Register 
concerning each proposed collection of information, including each new 
proposed collection, each proposed extension of existing collection of 
information, and each reinstatement of previously approved information 
collection before submitting the collection to the OMB for approval. To 
comply with this requirement, we are publishing this notice of a 
proposed data collection as described below.
    The OMB is particularly interested in comments that will help:
    1. Evaluate whether the proposed collection of information is 
necessary for the proper performance of the functions of the agency, 
including whether the information will have practical utility;
    2. Evaluate the accuracy of the agency's estimate of the burden of 
the proposed collection of information, including the validity of the 
methodology and assumptions used;
    3. Enhance the quality, utility, and clarity of the information to 
be collected; and
    4. Minimize the burden of the collection of information on those 
who are to respond, including through the use of appropriate automated, 
electronic, mechanical, or other technological collection techniques or 
other forms of information technology, e.g., permitting electronic 
submissions of responses.
    5. Assess information collection costs.

Proposed Project

    Understanding How Discounting Affects Decision Making and Adoption 
of Prevention Through Design Solutions--New--National Institute for 
Occupational Safety and Health, Centers for Disease Control and 
Prevention (CDC).

Background and Brief Description

    As mandated in the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 (Pub. 
L.

[[Page 63510]]

91-596), the mission of NIOSH is to conduct research and investigations 
on occupational safety and health. This project will focus on 
understanding the decision-making processes of small wholesale and 
small retail businesses in regards to the adoption of fall-prevention 
solutions. Slips, trips, and falls are major sources of workplace 
injury across all industry sectors and represent a significant burden. 
In the wholesale and retail trade sectors, slips, trips, and falls 
account for 25% of all reported injuries. By definition, small 
businesses employ fewer numbers of people, therefore a slip, trip, or 
fall resulting in an injury is less likely to occur in any given 
establishment. Small business employers may underestimate the risks 
associated with occupational slips, trips, and falls because they have 
not experienced them and therefore do not take the necessary steps to 
prevent them.
    One of the best ways to prevent and control occupational injuries, 
illnesses, and fatalities is to ``design out'' or minimize hazards and 
risks. NIOSH's Prevention Through Design Initiative focuses on this 
concept through the inclusion of prevention considerations in all 
designs that impact workers. Although employers' decisions can lead to 
the successful implementation of Prevention Through Design, fall-
prevention solutions are not well understood. More information is 
needed to better understand the motivational, social, and 
organizational factors that affect employers' decisions to adopt fall-
prevention solutions. This project will combine traditional surveys 
with behavioral economic methodologies to understand the decision-
making processes related to the adoption of fall-prevention solutions. 
By using behavioral economic principles and methods, this study will 
pose hypothetical, but realistic, scenarios to small business employers 
to assess the influence of several factors on the patterns of 
decisions. One of the goals of the study is to assess the subjective 
value of fall-prevention solutions based on their costs and effort 
required to use them. To quantify the subjective value of fall-
prevention solutions, this project will use the behavioral economic 
principles to assess the trade-offs small business owners make among 
the cost of fall prevention solutions, the amount of effort require to 
assemble them, and the amount of time they take to assemble. One of the 
behavioral economic principles is discounting, in which the value of a 
product or outcome decreases as the cost, effort, or delay associated 
with it increases. For example, small-business owners may ``discount'' 
the value of a fall-prevention solution if it requires great effort to 
assemble,
    The survey will include instruments to obtain demographic 
information (age, gender, income, etc.), organizational safety 
information (e.g., ``Has someone at your place of work ever been 
injured?''), and behavioral economic discounting assessments. For the 
behavioral economic questions in the survey, participants will be asked 
to make choices about hypothetical, but realistic, scenarios that 
assess the influence of several factors on the patterns of decision-
making. To date, no study has quantitatively assessed the safety-
related decision-making processes of small business employers from a 
behavioral economic perspective. Previous studies in this area consist 
of qualitative studies of some factors that affect occupational safety 
and health of small businesses. This study will address a knowledge gap 
in the professional and scientific literature by contributing 
quantitative data to a problem that has been overlooked. The results 
for this study are meant for theory development and are not intended to 
be nationally representative.
    The sample size for this survey will be 100 small business 
employers in the wholesale or retail trade sectors. This sample size is 
based on a power analysis which indicated that 100 respondents would be 
sufficient to detect any correlations between the organizational or 
demographic variables and the behavioral economic measures of decision 
making. Each web-based survey will take approximately 30 minutes to 
complete, resulting in an annualized burden estimate of 50 hours. There 
is no cost to respondents other than their time.

                                        Estimated Annualized Burden Hours
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                                                                     Number of    Average burden
      Type of respondents           Form name        Number of     responses per   per response    Total burden
                                                    respondents     respondent      (in hours)      (in hours)
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Small business employers......  Survey..........             100               1           30/60              50
                                                 ---------------------------------------------------------------
    Total.....................                                                                                50
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Jeffrey M. Zirger,
Acting Lead, Information Collection Review Office, Office of Scientific 
Integrity, Office of Science, Centers for Disease Control and 
Prevention.
[FR Doc. 2018-26636 Filed 12-7-18; 8:45 am]
 BILLING CODE 4163-18-P