WELL building: Key design features for office environments

This study aims to explore the key design features that support office building occupants from the adverse effects on health, well-being, and productivity (i.e., the three aspects in the WELL Building Standard). To achieve that aim, the objectives are to (1) identify the key design features that support health, well-being, and productivity; (2) compare the key design features; and (3) analyze the interrelationships between the key design features. Information from a systematic literature review and semistructured interviews with 23 office building occupants was used to develop a questionnaire survey consisting of 33 design features. Mann-Whitney U test, Kruskal-Wallis H test, normalized mean score ranking technique, overlapping analysis, and Spearman's correlation analysis were used to analyze 206 valid responses. The findings highlighted 11 key design features that simultaneously support office building occupants' health, well-being, and productivity. The design features are air quality, clean drinking water, comfortable artificial lighting, adjustable workstation, comfortable temperature, sufficient space, security system, safety at parking lots, cleanliness, efficiency in building services, and safe design. From these, the last six key design features are absent from the existing WELL Building Standard. The study findings provide new insights into the body of knowledge on WELL building. Industry practitioners can use the findings in designing, planning, and maintaining office buildings that support health, well-being, and productivity. Additionally, policymakers can establish an alternative rating tool for evaluating office buildings

Modeling COVID-19 impacts and response strategies in the construction industry: PLS–SEM approach

Policymakers are developing response strategies to reduce the impacts of COVID-19. However, developing response strategies without considering their relationships with the impacts of COVID-19 is ineffective. This study aims to model the causal relationships between COVID-19 impacts and response strategies in the construction industry, using Malaysia as a case study. To achieve this, a systematic literature review and semi-structured interviews with forty industry professionals were conducted, yielding 12 impacts and 22 response strategies. The impacts and strategies were inserted into a survey, and 107 valid responses were received. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was conducted to group the impacts and strategies. Then, partial least-squares structural equation modeling (PLS–SEM) was employed to identify the causal relationship between the impacts and strategies. The EFA results indicate that the underlying impacts are project-or material-related, and the underlying strategies are market stability and financial aid, supply chain and project support, and information and legislation. The PLS–SEM results indicate that supply chain and project support are required to address material-related impacts, and market stability and financial aid are required to address project-related impacts. This is the first paper that models the relationships between COVID-19 impacts and response strategies in the construction industry

The adoption of IOT in the Malaysian construction industry: Towards construction 4.0

The construction industry is one of the most significant sectors in Malaysia, specifically in terms of its contribution to the Malaysian Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and facilitation of other industries to enhance their productivity outcome by constructing buildings and facilities for them. However, the process of constructing buildings and facilities will take a long period of time if done according to conventional practices. Due to this circumstance, the establishment of the Internet of Things (IoT) in construction development is beneficial to improve productivity levels and reduce the construction time as well as the cost. Hence, this paper intends to review the adoption of IoT in Malaysia’s construction industry towards Construction 4.0. In conjunction with that, the use of IoT in terms of construction technology such as BIM, smart communication, sensor, big data, augmented reality, location services and remote operation during the construction process has made a massive impact on the monitoring of the construction process, especially in reducing the risk of construction error, defects, and avoiding construction delay. The proper adoption of IoT in the Malaysian construction industry will give a huge positive impact to the construction industry and encourage it to grow and compete with other developing countries. This paper is noteworthy to the Malaysian construction industry, especially for the key players in the construction industry to raise their awareness regarding the benefits of adopting IoT for their future projects

Application of decision support tool in design-build projects: A quasi-experiment with novice decision makers

Purpose: Design-Build (DB) is known as the alternative for Design-Bid-Build in the Malaysian construction industry. For DB projects, it is critical to adopt effective decision support tool to ensure the execution of a systematic decision-making technique. This study aimed to examine the impact of a decision support tool for novice decision makers to reject or adopt DB for their construction projects. Design/methodology/approach: Literature review and qualitative input from experts identified several key-selection factors pertaining to critical success factors and design-build drivers. This resulted in the development of Decision Support Tool for Design-Build (DST-DB). A quasi-experiment, which involved 382 novice decision makers in the construction industry, was conducted to test the DST-DB quantitatively. The participants were required to compare two construction projects using DST-DB and traditional decision-making methods. Multivariate analysis was performed to analyse all collected data. Findings: The quasi-experiment data suggests that DST-DB enables significantly higher usability, likelihood, precision, confidence and satisfaction rate when compared to the traditional decision-making process. The pre- and post-surveys indicated that the DST-DB is effective in improving decision-making performance through selection factors of client-briefing, maximised resources and sharing expertise. The participants also agreed that DST-DB is easy to use and helps them to gain better understanding of the decision-making process for construction projects. Originality/value: This research contributes to the existing body of knowledge through the impact of DST on the decisions of novices. The novice decision makers found that DST-DB is practically adaptable and comparatively effective for decision-making process than traditional decision-making methods. This contributes to the practical application of construction companies to provide DST-DB training to the fresh graduate employees to enhance their competencies in the decision-making process

A systematic bibliometric review of the United Nation’s SDGS: Which are the most related to higher education institutions?

Purpose: This study aims to provide the current and future state of United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in the higher education institutions (HEIs). Since the SDGs’ proliferation, HEIs have played a crucial part in meeting the goals. Despite the central role of HEIs in accomplishing the SDGs, there has been little attention in providing a comprehensive overview of the SDGs in relation to HEIs. Design/methodology/approach: A total of 280 publications in the Web of Science database were analyzed through a bibliometric approach consisting of citation analysis, co-citation analysis and co-occurrence of keywords analysis. This review explores the current state of SDGs, its central themes of research streams and predicts future direction in the context of HEIs. Findings: The findings would assist stakeholders to strategize the SDGs on HEIs, including the government and policymakers, university top management, benefactors and academics. Three main research streams were observed sustainable curriculum; challenges and barriers of SDGs; and COVID-19 and health management. Research limitations/implications: Implications suggest that to achieve the stipulated goals in the SDGs, proper planning and strategy should be aligned proportionate to the national agenda. Originality/value: This paper presents a novel knowledge structure by mapping the most relevant SDGs in the context of HEIs based on bibliometric analysis

Digital twin production in the architecture, engineering, construction and operation industry: Organizational attributes and strategies

Digital twin technology has grown over the years. However, a digital twin cannot be produced effectively without adequate organizational attributes. Inaccurate digital twins cannot be used for the operation and maintenance phase. Thus, an effective digital twin reduces waste resources in the operation and maintenance phase. The primary objective of this study is to identify the attributes to produce a digital twin in their building projects. In achieving the objective, interview data with 20 industry professionals involved with the digital twin was collected and analyzed. With the readiness assessment tool developed, relevant strategies can be implemented to correspond to the tool and allow for an improved future state in managing the construction industry. A total of three main categories and six subcategories were identified. The study findings can be used to develop organizational attributes and strategies required to produce a digital twin

Main challenges to concrete recycling in practice

While concrete recycling is crucial to protecting the environment, its implementation in practice is low in many countries. This study aims to highlight challenges to concrete recycling. To achieve that aim, the study objectives are (1) to identify the main challenges to concrete recycling in construction projects; (2) to compare the main challenges between small–medium enterprises (SMEs) and large enterprises (LEs); and (3) to determine the underlying groups among the main challenges. Potential challenges were identified through a systematic literature review of journal articles and semi-structured interviews with fifteen industry practitioners. Then, the identified challenges were inserted into a questionnaire survey and distributed to industry practitioners. Eighty-nine valid responses were collected and analyzed using the mean score ranking, normalization, agreement analysis, and factor analysis techniques. The analyses show thirteen main challenges to concrete recycling. The main challenges include increased project duration, lack of national programs, lack of comprehensive rules and regulations, increased project cost, low demand for recycled concrete, low cost-effectiveness of concrete recycling, and increased transportation cost. However, there is no consensus on the criticality between SMEs and LEs. For example, increased project cost is the main challenge for SMEs but is only middlingly ranked for LEs. Finally, the main challenges can be categorized into three interrelated groups: people and technical, legal and environmental, and economic challenges. This study contributes to the literature by analyzing challenges that hinder concrete recycling in practice. The findings allow researchers and practitioners to develop strategies to reduce concrete recycling rejection

The barriers factors and driving forces for BIM implementation in Malaysian AEC companies

The emergence of high technology in the built environment industry has caused BIM (Building Information Modelling) to become one of the processes that are sought by the construction industry players to enhance and improves the project lifecycle. Previous research showed that BIM implementation had given positive impact to the return of investment (ROI), productivity, lessen disputes between the construction players, saving in construction cost and decrease the risk of project delay which crucial in delivering a project on time. However, the vast majority of AEC companies not interested in BIM because of obstacles and barriers that they need to face in the process of adopting BIM practice. Due to that, this study focusses on investigating the barriers factors in BIM implementation by Malaysian AEC construction industry and identifying the driving forces available to overcome the BIM implementation issues in Malaysia. This study used a questionnaire survey approach for data collection and analyzed it using SPSS. As a result, the critical barrier factors faced by Malaysian AEC companies such as organization cultures, technology, and government recognition are identified. Meanwhile, in term of driven forces to overcome the BIM implementation issues, proper BIM guidelines or standard for BIM requirement has been identified as a crucial factor for successful implementation. Furthermore, BIM Fund also has been found as one of the driven forces for successful BIM implementation where it can help the AEC companies to cover the cost for training, consultancy services, software purchase and hardware for business and project. Drawn specifically within the Malaysian AEC companies in Penang and Kuala Lumpur, these findings provide a basis for fostering the implementation of BIM practice for better project performance

Heavy machinery operators : Necessary competencies to reduce construction accidents

The construction industry has been consistently performing poorly in safety resulting in substantial human and economic losses globally. The hazard related to heavy machinery operations can lead to injury or fatality of operators, workers, or visitors. Thus, safety training of heavy machinery operators (HMOs) is crucial to perform their tasks safely on construction projects. HMOs face various risks due to complex work environments at a job site such as the presence of other workers, material flow, equipment motion, and temporary structures that limit the space for heavy machinery. This research identifies the causes of accidents and competencies required to eliminate these accidents associated with heavy machinery operators. To achieve that, interview data with fifteen construction project managers are analyzed. This study's findings suggest that the causes of heavy machinery accidents include insufficient maintenance, negligence of operators, inadequate training, human factor, and site condition. Conversely, the competencies to mitigate heavy machinery accidents are knowledge of safety incentives and penalties from safety training, the ability to conduct safety briefing, inspect heavy machinery and site conditions, and communication skills. Industry practitioners and researchers can use these findings to enhance construction productivity by creating a safe working environment at construction sites

Impact of bauxite mining on quality of life : An analysis of road users

Mining activities are often associated with various adverse effects. Until now, most research focuses on the environmental, occupational, and health impacts of mining activities. However, existing literature lacks information on mining activities' impact on the quality of life of surrounding road users. Therefore, this research aims to compare the quality of life of road users between bauxite and non-bauxite areas. To achieve that objective, questionnaire survey data from road users were collected and analyzed. The findings suggest that the affected road users have an overall significantly lower health- related quality of life than the control group. Specifically, the affected road users have significantly lower physical-, psychological-, and social-related quality of life. While numerous other factors might influence the participants' quality of life, respondent demographic and road satisfaction variables have a low to a negligible relationship with the quality of life in this study. This research's key contribution is by identifying the impact of mining activities on road users in a developing country