Reyes Veras, P; Renukappa, S and Suresh, S (2022) Awareness of big data concept in the Dominican Republic construction industry: An empirical study. Construction Innovation, 22(3), pp. 465-486. ISSN 1471-4175
Abstract
Purpose: The construction industry, being one of the main activities in the ever-demanding need for technology developments, sometimes falls short of other industries in terms of implementation. The adoption of Big Data (BD) in industries such as health and retail has had positive impacts in aspects such as decision-making processes and forecasting trends that allow planning some future business movements. Hence, the question of whether these results can be imitated in the construction industry. Therefore, this paper aims to address the level of awareness identified as a first step towards implementation of the BD concept within the construction industry in the Dominican Republic (DR). Design/methodology/approach: As little to no information exist on the subject; the selected approach to perform this research was qualitative methodology; 21 semi-structured interviews were studied using situational awareness. Four levels of awareness were developed based on the Endsley’s Situation Awareness model. Findings: The results showed that nearly 95% of the interviewees had either no knowledge or very basic awareness of the BD requirements or intermediate awareness, but only 5% had applied BD concepts in the construction industry. Originality/value: This study shows the gaps that exist in the understanding and implementation of BD concepts in the DR construction industry. This paper establishes the need to develop continuous professional development programmes for construction professionals and a need to update curriculum in construction-related education.
| Item Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | awareness; big data; construction; Dominican Republic; technology; velocity; volume |
| Index terms: | technology development, methodology, Dominican Republic, big data, programme, interview, movement, construction industry, implementation, empirical study, construction professional, decision-making process, falls, forecasting, professional development |
| Subjects: | industry analysis, information systems, project controls, decision analysis, Geography, professional development, health risk and incident analysis, research methods, innovation and technology management, contractual arrangements, prediction and forecasting, health behaviours and lifestyles, data collection methods |
| Topics: | Information Management, Engineering Principles, Geographical Context, Research Practice, Health and Safety, Procurement, Risk Management, Digital Applications, Time Control |
| 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