The aim of this study is to investigate the effects of occupational noise, thermal comfort, and lighting conditions on psychological symptoms by evaluating occupational hygiene exposures of workers in highly hazardous industrial facilities. The study's sample population comprises 555 workers from three distinct companies, classified under the NACE code for highly hazardous industries. The Symptom Checklist (SCL-90-R) was administered to ascertain the psychological symptoms exhibited by the workers. Descriptive statistics, independent t-tests, and one-way ANOVA were used to analyze the data obtained in the study. The results of the study indicated that 36.9% of the workers were exposed to noise levels that exceeded the established limit values, 27.9% were employed in hot environments, and 53.5% worked under inadequate lighting conditions. A significant relationship was found between higher noise exposure, poor thermal comfort conditions, and insufficient lighting and elevated SCL-90-R scores (p0.001). In conclusion, the findings of the study clearly demonstrate that, in highly hazardous industries, protecting employees’ mental health is just as critical as safeguarding their physical health, despite often being overlooked.
Ülkü et al. (2026) studied this question.