Occupational means to do with a person's job. Occupational health, occupational hazard, occupational therapy.
It appears almost entirely in fixed pairs. An occupational hazard is a risk that comes with the work, used half jokingly. Occupational therapy helps people do the ordinary activities of daily life, which is a much broader job than the name suggests and is often confused with physiotherapy. Note occupation; and that occupation here means a job.
1adjectiveoccupationalTo do with a person's job.
“Bakers can suffer from an occupational form of asthma caused by breathing in flour.”
occupational is a quality of relating to work.
Proto-Indo-European
*kap- — to seize, grab
Latin
occupātiō
Middle French
occupacion
Middle English
occupacioun
English
occupation
English, today
occupational
Built from
From occupation + -al. occupation comes from Middle English occupacioun, borrowed from Middle French occupacion, occupation, from Latin occupātiō, occupātiōnis, from occupo (“occupy, seize”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European kap- (“to seize, grab”). by surface analysis, occupy + -ation.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA