Dawood, N and Sikka, S (2007) Measuring the effectiveness of 4D planning as a valuable communication tool. In: Boyd, D (ed.) Proceedings of 23rd Annual ARCOM Conference, 3-5 September 2007, Belfast, UK.
Abstract
Construction industry is very much information hungry and is often described as a slow adopter of new IT technologies. The importance of sharing and communicating information is becoming increasingly important through out the whole life of a construction project. Communication of information among different stakeholders is becoming critical as each stakeholder possess different set of skills. As a result, extraction, interpretation and communication of complex design information from drawings is a time consuming and difficult process. Advanced visualisation technologies, like 4D planning (3D product model integrated with schedules) have tremendous potential to increase the communication efficiency and interpretation ability of the project team. Visualisation is the process of displaying information which assists in understanding and evaluating information. However, its use as an effective communication tool is still limited and not fully explored. The main objective of this research is to investigate and measure the effectiveness of communicating construction information of product and processes using 4D models over traditional 2D (two-dimensional) CAD drawings. A 4D experimental exercise has been developed and an experiment has been conducted among participants in different age groups (11 to 22 + yrs) and profiles. The purpose of this research is to evaluate how much information participants are able to extract and retain in their mind by analysing two different graphical representation formats (2D CAD or 4D models). The experiments had been carried out with two groups (2D & 4D). One group used 2D CAD drawings describing the plans, elevation and section, and a bar chart showing the construction schedule. Other group used a 4D visualisation model of the house showing the construction sequence. Participants in both the groups are required to construct the physical model of the house using Lego kit (423 bricks) in the allotted duration of two hours. The results of the experiments showed that the 4D group were able to communicate, coordinate and retain more information as compared to 2D group. The outcomes of the research has provided quantitative evidence of the benefits of 4D planning as an efficient communication tool as compared to two-dimensional paper approach.
| Item Type: | Conference Paper (Paper) |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | communication; information retention; 2D CAD; 4D planning; visualisation; lego bricks |
| Index terms: | 4D visualization, drawing, experiment, physical model, efficiency, becoming, exercise, product model, 4D planning, retention, visualization, duration, construction industry, project team, graphical representation, construction project, evidence, effectiveness |
| Subjects: | project delivery, technical documentation, visualization, modelling and simulation, health behaviours and lifestyles, data collection methods, evaluation and assessment methods, philosophical process, industry analysis, project controls, production management, design practice, manufacturing engineering, management, performance management |
| Topics: | Human Resources, Quality Management, Digital Applications, Design Practice, Time Control, Engineering Principles, Project Management, Research Practice, Health and Safety |
| Descriptive scope: | 5 PCTEA |
N.B. Descriptive scope is a count of how many of the five facets of empirical research are indicated by the words used in title, abstract and keywords. It is not intended as a judgement on the research; merely a count of the kind of word we would expect to indicate Phenomenon, Concepts, Theoretical framing, Empirical techniques, Analytical techniques. If all five are present, then a code of “5 PCTEA” will indicate this. If you feel the coding for this record is questionable, we welcome discussion around the terms we matched or the way we categorized them. The facet you would expect may not be coded, or a facet may be coded inappropriately. This can also bear on a larger question, of which facets should be treated as defining in construction management research. Please get in touch, and we will look at it. More details here