75 research outputs found
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Accounting for users: design team work in immersive virtual reality environments
The study examines how designers account for the use and users of their design in the situation of reviewing the design in an Immersive Virtual Reality Environment (IVRE). The focus is on the interactions whereby designers express the imagined perspective of being users, and on how the design meeting is configured with respect to the concern around the use of the future building by the real users. Observations are made around how designers express these ānarrativesā around experiencing a design as imaginary users through various modes (verbal, graphical, behavioural) involving different procedures and forms of representation. The case study is an on-going construction project for a new hospital in the UK, where an IVRE was used performing design review sessions during the bid preparation stage. Drawing on data based on direct observation and audio-video recordings of multiple design meetings, the scrutiny is on how architects adopt the position of end- users in design sessions in which users do not participate. The aim is to examine the nature and dynamics of interactions inside a design team as they imagine usersā needs in an IVRE. The focus is on how architects express and test the āusageā of their design in this particular technological setting, where life- like movements and physical interactions with the design are possible
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Making the link between BIM's benefits and implementation
Despite the attention paid to measuring the perceived benefits of BIM increasing its adoption throughout the construction industry, important links between implementation, support and benefits have received little focus.
This paper explores how the conditions of implementation define the benefits of BIM adoption. The findings from two case studies implementing and using BIM are presented and compared. The first is a large urban regeneration project and the second is a healthcare project.
A well-recognised model of system success was mobilised from the field of information systems to reveal that irrespective of project size and type, without sufficient support that addresses business process reengineering implementation is focussed on technology and technical process. This confines the benefits to productivity and efficiency gains associated with technical changes, and any potential improvements to the effective exchange of information for collaboration are difficult to achieve because they are inextricably linked to process changes at an organisational level. In effect, limited focus on the organisational aspects of BIM adoption inhibits the scalability of the benefits the technology provides.
Focus is on the disconnections between organisational level BIM implementation and project level BIM implementation. An incendiary issue for both cases was BIM awareness amongst project participants and stakeholders, however, the effect of this on implementation success varies within each case study.
In using the Delone & McLean Model to systematically examine the system at a point of reconfiguration, benefits are captured relative to the implementation approach. This study highlights the significance of these interdependencies and argues for a more comprehensive approach to BIM benefits capture that recognises this to usefully inform implementation strategy development
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The unexplored brutality of performance recipes
In the context of a predominantly managerial discourse, innovation in construction is often conceived in linear terms as a one-way diffusion process. Innovation is to be facilitated by management and is equated with the beneficial spread of novel technologies and operational ideas to a population of firms: from those that are āin the knowā to those that are not. Lean Construction, Integrated Project Delivery and Building Information Modelling are well-known innovations in this sense. These are large scale, all-encompassing and well-intended recipes for industry improvement and change. However, in spite of the rhetoric around Lean, IPD or BIM, diffusion of these ideas, principles and technologies has been slow. This can be attributed to a gap between the persuasiveness of linear diffusion models and the realities of complex, messy, and fragmented construction activities. Perhaps as a response to this, recent attempts have been made to broaden the appeal and increase the coverage of performance recipes ā by linking them together. This just further obscures the tension between simplistic models of innovation and the complexity of construction innovation process involving many actors, interests and activities. To address this, we develop a systemic, rather than linear, understanding of innovation, which accounts for, rather than obscures, complexity and heterogeneity. In doing so, the underlying and often reductionist assumptions on which Lean, IPD and BIM as innovation programs are based, become visible. By highlighting how these innovations make assumptions about complexity in construction, the relationships and tensions between recipes are highlighted. The different and often brutal ways in which construction is reproduced and reduced through representation in these recipes points to the inherent problems with linear models of construction innovation, and suggests alternative system-oriented perspectives
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Designers' perspectives on the use of immersive virtual reality technology in practice
The role of emerging virtual reality (VR)/ BIM enabled technologies on the construction design process is examined in this paper from an angle of understanding the contextual use of technology in practice. Drawing attention to the dynamics of interrelating the social, perceptual and material/ technical mechanisms involved, the study takes an interest in issues of understanding and reflecting on the effect of immersive technologies on construction design activities as used in concrete āreal ālifeā settings and as perceived by practitioners. The case study is an on-going construction project for a new hospital in the UK, where an immersive VR environment (IVRE) was used performing design review sessions during the bid preparation stage. It is about understanding practitionersā reflection hence the study augments previous insights based on direct observation and audio-video recordings of multiple design meetings with interviewing the design participants. The focus is on designersā perception of the events, their reflection back on their actions, their conceptual understanding of using IVRE in the process, and their view on the possible connection with broader practices of design. A particular strategy was applied in conducting retrospective discussions with the participants in a data review session format, consisting in both playing back video-clips (thematically selected from the video data set), and revealing the researcherās interpretation around what was happening during the design sessions. This was aimed to allow the participantsā reflection on how they experienced particular episodes and to engage them with the research questions, for asking them to describe their understanding and reasoning behind the events. Early analysis suggests that the interview data is particularly informing with regard to participantsā perspective on how using IVRE in the design review connects with other VR/ BIM enabled ways of performing the process and exposes their insight on the potential impact on the broader construction context
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Challenging design perceptions in immersive virtual reality environments?
The potential and use of immersive virtual reality (IVR) technologies in performing design and construction activities has been widely addressed in the literature. However, research is only just beginning to emerge which examines the role of these technologies in use in āreal-lifeā practice situations, and seldom if ever addresses the way surprise and novelty impact both experience of these technologies, and of the designs they are representing. Adopting a practice based perspective to understanding the effect of immersive technologies on construction design work as used in concrete āreal -lifeā settings and as perceived by the practitioners involved, this study draws a specific focus on the concept of āsurpriseā around using these technologies. The empirical case examined is a āreal-lifeā construction design project for a new hospital in the UK wherein a CAVE environment was used performing design review sessions during the bid preparation stage. The methodology draws on accessing participantsā view on their surprise emerging in the CAVE through reflective conversations oriented to engage the participants in retrospective reflection on their CAVE design experience. The analysis reveals that the element of surprise encountered by the participants both within making sense of the newly experienced technology, and within orienting to the design in the immersive environment played an important role in performing design review in the CAVE. The findings indicate that using CAVE as design media is not only enhancing or adding to an existing understanding of design through paper based or non-immersive digital representations, but it is also, and perhaps most significantly, challenging the participantsā understanding of the design as they experience the immersive, full scale version of it
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Influence of multiparty IPD contracts on construction innovation
Construction is often cited for challenges in adopting new innovations, slow diffusion of innovations through the industry, and significant barriers to adoption for firms. The reasons for the challenges are often tied to the fragmented nature of the industry, with vertical, horizontal and longitudinal fragmentation creating boundaries to sharing information or collaboration to enable innovative solutions. These boundaries that divide firms by area of expertise, timing of involvement, and alignment with project goals offer little incentive for seeking innovative solutions, or may even penalize firms that pursue innovative solutions. The rise of multiparty contractual agreements have enabled discussion regarding means of increasing collaboration, decreasing the negative effects associated with fragmentation, and ultimately increasing the potential for innovation in the delivery of construction projects. This paper seeks to analyze the barriers associated with innovation in the construction industry and explore the opportunities for improving the adoption and diffusion of innovation through the use of multiparty Integrated Project Delivery (IPD) contracts. Using the lens of innovative capacity, defined as the abilities and willingness of firms to engage in inter-organizational, collaborative and distributed novel activities, project outcomes will be explored for both innovation and diffusion. In addition, insights from a case study IPD project will be provided based upon a lessons learned workshop for a first time IPD owner with their signatory team members, facilitated by an IPD expert
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The futures of construction management research
Construction management is an internationally recognized area of research with an established and growing community of academics. It has grown from largely āresearch consultancyā activities to additionally attracting significant amounts of academic research funding and has, partially, moved away from its applied, engineering dominated origins to increasingly engage with, and contribute to, mainstream academic debates in business and management, economics and the social sciences. It has, as such, become an academic field in its own right. However, recent dynamics within both university institutions and national economies are changing the landscape of construction management research (CMR). A blurring of traditional university boundaries, reprioritization of research funding and increasing emphasis on national and international rankings have led to increased pressure on individual academics and the community they constitute. Drawing on scenario development we ask what, in the face of a turbulent environment, might the futures of CMR be? Four potential futures for CMR are outlined, depicted as four potential scenarios: convergence, retrenchment, disappearance and hybridization. These describe potential outcomes from the institutional dynamics currently at play. The intention is neither to predict the future, nor to prioritize one scenario over another, but to open a debate on the institutional pressures the field is facing, and what the outcomes might be
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Designing in caves: using immersive visualisations in design practice
This paper describes a study of the use of immersive Virtual reality technologies in the design of a new hospital. It uses Schƶnās concept of reflective practice and video-based methods to analyse the ways design teams approach and employ a full scale 3D immersive environment ā a CAVE ā in collaborative design work. The analysis describes four themes relating to reflective practice occurring in the setting: orienting to the CAVE technology itself, orienting to the representation of the specific design within the CAVE, activities accounting for, or exploring alternatives within the design for the use and users of the space, and more strategic interactions around how to best represent the design and model to the client within the CAVE setting. The analysis also reveals some unique aspects of design work in this environment. Perhaps most significantly, rather than enhancing or adding to an existing understanding of design through paper based or non-immersive digital representations, it is often acting to challenge or surprise the participants as they experience the immersive, full scale version of their own design
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Provision of disability adaptations to the home: analysis of household survey data
The move towards greater provision of healthcare at home has been a significant policy intention for the last two decades (Ham et al. 2012). Key to this ambition is the need to provide suitable accommodation for disabled households by installing a range of possible adaptations. Using data from English Housing Surveys of 2003/4 and 2009/10, we compare levels of the provision of adaptations with a number of socio-cultural variables, and report on some significant correlations. This includes most importantly, bias against non-white disabled households and younger disabled households, a significant link between rented accommodation and disabled households, and a worrying increase in the proportion of adaptations deemed by the householders to be ānot neededā, from 7% to 25%, over that six year time period.
We discuss the context of these results and conclude with an outline plan for future research, which is urgently needed to verify and understand the issues raised
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Epistemological differences and new technology in construction
New technology within the construction industry originates from appeals to replicate the efficiencies seen in other sectors such as automation and manufacturing and construction firms are increasingly engaging in collaborative research and development (R&D) projects with sector specialists. These R&D projects create new communities of practice with a shared collection of knowledge, experience, and problem-solving approaches representing the disparate expertise of each member contributing to the development of new and innovative technological solutions. However, fundamental epistemological differences between the collaborating firms can hinder this process. Shared knowledge and experience to develop ideas is not easily communicated across a project team within which each member possesses a differing approach to understanding the common problem. This paper presents early research engagement in an R&D project investigating the potential of utilising Flexible Robotic Assembly Modules in the Built Environment (FRAMBE). Challenges observed to date during the process of developing FRAMBE as a technological solution are described. This paper aims to exemplify communication issues within cross-sector R&D projects to argue that boundary objects offer a means to consider the epistemological differences within communities of practice, establish a common understanding of the problem, and therefore ways in which to resolve issues surrounding technology development
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