In a 5 Whys accident analysis, the investigator will dig deeper to uncover an accident ____.

In a 5 Whys accident analysis, the investigator will dig deeper to uncover an accident ____.

• A. causation
• B. root cause
• C. symptom
• D. consequence

Answer: (A)

The main idea is to identify the underlying reason an accident happened by asking why until you reach the fundamental factor. In a 5 Whys analysis, the investigator digs deeper to uncover the root cause—the underlying issue that, if fixed, would prevent the same accident from occurring again. That’s the best target because solving the root cause addresses the core deficiency that allowed the incident to happen, rather than just stopping the symptom, the observable sign, or the immediate consequence. A symptom is only a sign of a larger problem, and a consequence is the outcome of the event, not the driver you need to fix. Causation describes the relationship between events, but 5 Whys aims at the specific underlying cause that can be corrected to prevent recurrence.

The main idea is to identify the underlying reason an accident happened by asking why until you reach the fundamental factor. In a 5 Whys analysis, the investigator digs deeper to uncover the root cause—the underlying issue that, if fixed, would prevent the same accident from occurring again. That’s the best target because solving the root cause addresses the core deficiency that allowed the incident to happen, rather than just stopping the symptom, the observable sign, or the immediate consequence. A symptom is only a sign of a larger problem, and a consequence is the outcome of the event, not the driver you need to fix. Causation describes the relationship between events, but 5 Whys aims at the specific underlying cause that can be corrected to prevent recurrence.