Introduction: research directed to improving women's occupational health

This paper reviews briefly recent developments in research on women's occupational health and safety in five areas: documenting the unexpectedly heavy physical and mental workload involved in occupations traditionally assigned to women; showing the consequences for women's health of their precarious relationship to the work force; demonstrating the health effects of the double workday; studying the effects of work on those aspects of biology that are sex-specific; suggesting ways to remove ergonomic barriers to women entering non-traditional jobs which have been designed in relation to the typical male body. Suggestions are made for future research in these areas, in response to the needs of working women. This paper serves as an introduction to the volume of Women and Health dealing with women's occupational health and safety.