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1 – 10 of 49Haonan Qi, Zhipeng Zhou, Javier Irizarry, Xiaopeng Deng, Yifan Yang, Nan Li and Jianliang Zhou
This study aims to modify the human factors analysis and classification system (HFACS) to make it suitable for collapse accident analysis in construction. Based upon the modified…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to modify the human factors analysis and classification system (HFACS) to make it suitable for collapse accident analysis in construction. Based upon the modified HFACS, distribution patterns of causal factors across multiple levels were discerned among causal factors of various stakeholders at construction sites. It explored the correlations between two causal factors from different levels and further determined causation paths from two perspectives of level and stakeholder.
Design/methodology/approach
The main research framework consisted of data collection, coding and analysis. Collapse accident reports were collected with adequate causation information. The modified HFACS was utilized for coding causal factors across all five levels in each case. A hybrid approach with two perspectives of level and stakeholder was proposed for frequency analysis, correlation analysis and path identification between causal factors.
Findings
Eight causal factors from external organizations at the fifth level were added to the original HFACS. Level-based correlation analyses and path identification provided safety managers with a holistic view of inter-connected causal factors across five levels. Stakeholder-based correlation analyses between causal factors from the fifth level and its non-adjacent levels were implemented based on client, government and third parties. These identified paths were useful for different stakeholders to develop specific safety plans for avoiding construction collapse accidents.
Originality/value
This paper fulfils an identified need to modify and utilize the HFACS model for correlation analysis and path identification of causal factors resulting in collapse accidents, which can provide opportunities for tailoring preventive and protective measures at construction sites.
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Qingyang Wang, Weifeng Wu, Ping Zhang, Chengqiang Guo and Yifan Yang
To guide the stable radius clearance choice of water-lubricated bearings for single screw compressors, this paper aims to analyze the effects of turbulence and cavitation on…
Abstract
Purpose
To guide the stable radius clearance choice of water-lubricated bearings for single screw compressors, this paper aims to analyze the effects of turbulence and cavitation on bearing performance under two conditions of specified external load and radius clearance.
Design/methodology/approach
A modified Reynolds equation considering turbulence and cavitation is adopted, based on the Jakobsson–Floberg–Olsson boundary condition, Ng–Pan model and turbulent factors. The equation is solved using the finite difference method and successive over-relaxation method to investigate the bearing performance.
Findings
The turbulent effect can increase the hydrodynamic pressure and cavitation. In addition, the turbulent effect can lead to an increase in the equilibrium radius clearance. The turbulent region exhibits a higher load capacity and cavitation rate. However, the increased cavitation negatively impacts the frictional coefficient and end flow rate. The impact of turbulence increases as the radius clearance decreases. As the rotating speed increases, the turbulence effect has a greater impact on the bearing characteristics.
Originality/value
The research can provide theoretical support for the design of water-lubricated journal bearings used in high-speed water-lubricated single screw compressors.
Peer review
The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/ILT-01-2024-0029/
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Hongyang Li, Yanlin Chen, Junwei Zheng, Yuan Fang, Yifan Yang, Martin Skitmore, Rosemarie Rusch and Tingting Jiang
In the absence of previous work, this study investigates how the psychological contract (PC) influences the safety performance of construction workers in China.
Abstract
Purpose
In the absence of previous work, this study investigates how the psychological contract (PC) influences the safety performance of construction workers in China.
Design/methodology/approach
The literature is first consulted to obtain a set of PC and safety performance measures that fits the specific situation of construction workers, which is then moderated by five construction experts. A questionnaire survey of 206 workers from 4 different construction sites is followed by a descriptive statistical analysis of the nature of the PC and level of the safety performance of the respondents. Finally, a regression analysis is used to ascertain the level of influence of the PS, and an analysis is made of the influence of PC on safety performance.
Findings
A set of PC and safety performance measures is identified that fits in the construction workers' specific situation. The PC of the respondents is found to be intact and well-performed, and their safety performance is maintained at a high level. Safety performance is highly influenced by the state of the PC, with the three dimensions of safety performance (safety result, safety compliance and safety participation) positively correlated with the three dimensions of the PC (normative, interpersonal and developmental).
Originality/value
Suggestions are made to improve safety production management and safety performance by providing adequate material and economic conditions, helping the workers establish good interpersonal relationships and realize their personal values.
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Shenghua Zhou, S. Thomas Ng, Sang Hoon Lee, Frank J. Xu and Yifan Yang
In the architecture, engineering and construction (AEC) industry, technology developers have difficulties in fully understanding user needs due to the high domain knowledge…
Abstract
Purpose
In the architecture, engineering and construction (AEC) industry, technology developers have difficulties in fully understanding user needs due to the high domain knowledge threshold and the lack of effective and efficient methods to minimise information asymmetry between technology developers and AEC users. The paper aims to discuss this issue.
Design/methodology/approach
A synthetic approach combining domain knowledge and text mining techniques is proposed to help capture user needs, which is demonstrated using building information modelling (BIM) apps as a case. The synthetic approach includes the: collection and cleansing of BIM apps’ attribute data and users’ comments; incorporation of domain knowledge into the collected comments; performance of a sentiment analysis to distinguish positive and negative comments; exploration of the relationships between user sentiments and BIM apps’ attributes to unveil user preferences; and establishment of a topic model to identify problems frequently raised by users.
Findings
The results show that those BIM app categories with high user interest but low sentiments or supplies, such as “reality capture”, “interoperability” and “structural simulation and analysis”, should deserve greater efforts and attention from developers. BIM apps with continual updates and of small size are more preferred by users. Problems related to the “support for new Revit”, “import & export” and “external linkage” are most frequently complained by users.
Originality/value
The main contributions of this work include: the innovative application of text mining techniques to identify user needs to drive BIM apps development; and the development of a synthetic approach to orchestrating domain knowledge, text mining techniques (i.e. sentiment analysis and topic modelling) and statistical methods in order to help extract user needs for promoting the success of emerging technologies in the AEC industry.
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Fan Yang, Yifan Fei, Lin Guo, Xiuxiu Bai and Xiaodong Li
Young construction project management practitioners (CPMPs) have unique, complex, and notable occupational mental health problems. However, there were few studies about the…
Abstract
Purpose
Young construction project management practitioners (CPMPs) have unique, complex, and notable occupational mental health problems. However, there were few studies about the intervention for occupational mental health of CPMPs, and traditional intervention modes often failed to achieve significant effects. Therefore, this study aims to propose a new and effective intervention method.
Design/methodology/approach
Job crafting intervention was used to design an intervention experiment. A total of 72 CPMPs participated in a 10-week randomized controlled trial in China. Descriptive statistics and repeated measures analysis of variance were used to verify the effectiveness of job crafting intervention (JCI) on job crafting behaviors, job burnout, and work engagement with consideration of the impact of time.
Findings
Results showed that the intervention increased social resources, thus effectively reducing job burnout and promoting work engagement. Time also had a significant impact on cynicism, dedication, and social resources.
Practical implications
The authors should promote the habit of job crafting in CPMPs. Furthermore, in order to facilitate their job crafting, the authors should increase structural and social resources for them, and the authors can also encourage them to undertake challenging demands to increase their self-efficacy and the sense of achievement.
Originality/value
The authors bring into light a new psychological intervention approach among CPMPs, which integrates the advantages of the guidance in traditional organized intervention methods and the proactivity in individual spontaneous job crafting. The authors verify the efficacy of the JCI among CPMPs and help propose countermeasures and suggestions to improve the occupational mental health of CPMPs.
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Jian-jun Yuan, Shuai Wang, Weiwei Wan, Yanxue Liang, Luo Yang and Yifan Liu
The aim of this paper is to implement direct teaching of industrial manipulators using current sensors. The traditional way to implement teaching is either to use a teaching…
Abstract
Purpose
The aim of this paper is to implement direct teaching of industrial manipulators using current sensors. The traditional way to implement teaching is either to use a teaching pedant, which is time consuming, or use force sensors, which increases system cost. To overcome these disadvantages, a novel method is explored in the paper by using current sensors installed at joints as torque observers.
Design/methodology/approach
The method uses current sensors installed at each joint of a manipulator as torque observers and estimates external forces from differences between joint-driven torque computed based on the values of current sensors and commanded values of motor-driven torque. The joint-driven torque is computed by cancelling out both pre-calibrated gravity and friction resistance (compensation). Also, to make the method robust, the paper presents a strategy to detect unexpected slowly drifts and zero external forces and stop the robot in those situations.
Findings
Experimental results demonstrated that compensating the joint torques using both pre-calibrated gravity and friction resistance has performance comparable to a force sensor installed on the end effector of a manipulator. It is possible to implement satisfying direct teaching without using force sensors on 7 degree of freedom manipulators with large mass and friction resistance.
Originality/value
The main contribution of the paper is that the authors cancel out both pre-calibrated gravity and friction resistance to improve the direct teaching using only current sensors; they develop methods to avoid unsafe situations like slow drifts. The method will benefit industrial manipulators, especially those with large mass and friction resistance, to realize flexible and reliable direct teaching.
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Shiqi Liu, Tao Shen, Yuliang Wu, Yang Chen, Yifan Li, Yumeng Tang and Lu Lu
Extant research has paid considerable attention to the effects of enterprise social media (ESM) on employees' work attitudes and outcomes, yet the authors know little about the…
Abstract
Purpose
Extant research has paid considerable attention to the effects of enterprise social media (ESM) on employees' work attitudes and outcomes, yet the authors know little about the influence of job demands arising from the implementation of ESM. Drawing on resource allocation theory, the purpose of this study is to unravel how ESM-related job demands influence employee outcomes.
Design/methodology/approach
This study conducts a two-wave time-lagged survey of 223 employees from 53 teams in 14 financial service firms in China to test the conceptual model.
Findings
The findings of this paper indicate that ESM-related job demands have indirect effects on employee outcomes (i.e. job satisfaction and work–family conflict), and emotional exhaustion plays an intermediary role in these relationships. Specifically, ESM-related job demands have a U-shaped effect on emotional exhaustion.
Originality/value
This study combines job demands with ESM research and clarifies the mechanism behind how ESM-related job demands at different intensity affect employee outcomes from a new perspective. Moreover, this study’s findings suggest several beneficial courses of action for managers to take advantage of ESM.
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Bingjun Li, Shuhua Zhang, Wenyan Li and Yifan Zhang
Grey modeling technique is an important element of grey system theory, and academic articles applied to agricultural science research have been published since 1985, proving the…
Abstract
Purpose
Grey modeling technique is an important element of grey system theory, and academic articles applied to agricultural science research have been published since 1985, proving the broad applicability and effectiveness of the technique from different aspects and providing a new means to solve agricultural science problems. The analysis of the connotation and trend of the application of grey modeling technique in agricultural science research contributes to the enrichment of grey technique and the development of agricultural science in multiple dimensions.
Design/methodology/approach
Based on the relevant literature selected from China National Knowledge Infrastructure, the Web of Science, SpiScholar and other databases in the past 37 years (1985–2021), this paper firstly applied the bibliometric method to quantitatively visualize and systematically analyze the trend of publication, productive author, productive institution, and highly cited literature. Then, the literature is combed by the application of different grey modeling techniques in agricultural science research, and the literature research progress is systematically analyzed.
Findings
The results show that grey model technology has broad prospects in the field of agricultural science research. Agricultural universities and research institutes are the main research forces in the application of grey model technology in agricultural science research, and have certain inheritance. The application of grey model technology in agricultural science research has wide applicability and precise practicability.
Originality/value
By analyzing and summarizing the application trend of grey model technology in agricultural science research, the research hotspot, research frontier and valuable research directions of grey model technology in agricultural science research can be more clearly grasped.
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Zhifei Yang, Zhiye Du, Jiangjun Ruan, Shuo Jin, Guodong Huang, Qixiang Lian and Yifan Liao
The purpose of this paper is numerical calculation of total electric field in oil-paper insulation. Now, there is no effective method to consider the influence of space charges…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is numerical calculation of total electric field in oil-paper insulation. Now, there is no effective method to consider the influence of space charges when calculating the total electric field distribution in the main insulation system of the valve-side winding of an ultra-high-voltage direct current converter transformer.
Design/methodology/approach
To calculate the total electric field in an oil-paper insulation system, a new simulation method in single-layer oil-paper insulation based on the transient upstream finite element method (TUFEM) is proposed, in which the time variable is considered. The TUFEM is used to calculate the total electric field in an oil-paper insulation system by considering the move law of space charges. The simulation method is verified by comparing the simulation results to the test data. The move law of space charges and distribution characteristics of the electric field under difference voltage values in single-layer oil-paper insulation were presented.
Findings
The results show that the TUFEM has an excellent accuracy compared with the test data. When carrier mobility is a constant, the time to reach the steady state is inversely correlated with the initial electric field intensity, and the distortion rate of the internal total electric field is positively correlated with the initial electric field intensity.
Originality/value
This paper provides an exploratory research on the simulation of space charge transport phenomenon in oil-paper and has guiding significance to the design of oil-paper insulation.
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Bojun Hou, Yifan Zhu, Jin Hong, Jingjun Wei and Shuai Wang
Based on the density dependence theory, this paper attempts to explore how two types of interdependence among firms located in the same national high-tech zones (NHTZs) …
Abstract
Purpose
Based on the density dependence theory, this paper attempts to explore how two types of interdependence among firms located in the same national high-tech zones (NHTZs) – mutualism and competition – affect entrepreneurship in the NHTZs. The authors suggest that increasing firm density can help enhance legitimacy and form mutual networks. However, as the competition becomes fierce, the above positive relationship will weaken when the firm density exceeds a certain level. In addition, the authors are interested in whether the age of NHTZs would affect their sensitivity to legitimacy and competition and whether firm density affects entrepreneurship.
Design/methodology/approach
This article formulates two hypotheses from the theoretical deduction. The hypotheses are examined using the ordinary least squares (OLS) regression with a unique, unbalanced panel dataset of Chinese NHTZs spanning from 2014 to 2021. Considering potential endogeneity risk among the variables, the authors attempt to lag variables and ultimately find the results are still robust.
Findings
Drawing upon the density dependence theory, the empirical results show firm density is conducive to promoting entrepreneurship, while the positive relationship between community density and NHTZs' entrepreneurship gradually weakens as the firm density surpasses a certain level. The dynamics between mutualism and competition have different impacts on NHTZs' entrepreneurship. In addition, the results demonstrate that the linkage between firm interdependence and entrepreneurship is stronger for younger NHTZs. Firm density has an impact on entrepreneurship through legitimacy and excessive competition effects.
Research limitations/implications
On the one hand, the research period of this paper is 2014–2021, as the China Torch Statistical Yearbook only started to publish operating revenues in 2014, so the data period of this paper is relatively short. More research can be done in the future when more data is disclosed. On the other hand, the qualitative analysis cannot be conducted because of the limited data and materials. In future research, the qualitative analysis of entrepreneurial activities in NHTZs, such as questionnaires or case studies, needs to be supplemented, which will be an interesting direction.
Practical implications
Most existing research has not distinguished the differences between NHTZs (Wang et al., 2019), especially the differences in legitimacy and access to resources caused by the age of NHTZs. This article considers the heterogeneity between NHTZs, which helps to provide theoretical and practical evidence for a transition economy like China to make trade-off decisions on balancing absorbing new entrants with promoting the efficient allocation of resources based on the density and age of NHTZs.
Social implications
Drawing upon density dependency theory, this paper enriches the literature on agglomeration and entrepreneurship with a new perspective and extends the study to NHTZs.
Originality/value
First, this paper provides new evidence on how agglomeration affects entrepreneurship from an ecological perspective with the help of mutualism and competition interdependence. Most studies have explored the role of agglomeration in entrepreneurship, focussing on social networks, knowledge spillovers or resource endowments (Acs et al., 2013; Capozza et al., 2018; Yu, 2020). Drawing upon density dependency theory, this paper enriches the literature on agglomeration and entrepreneurship with a new perspective and extends the study to NHTZs. Second, the emphasis of science parks has been primarily on qualitative or case studies (Salvador et al., 2013; Guo and Verdini, 2015; Xie et al., 2018). We have diversified the quantitative research between agglomeration and entrepreneurship by using panel data from Chinese NHTZs from 2014 to 2021. Third, most existing research has not distinguished the differences between NHTZs (Wang et al., 2019), especially the differences in legitimacy and access to resources caused by the age of NHTZs. This article considers the heterogeneity between NHTZs, which helps to provide theoretical and practical evidence for a transition economy like China to make trade-off decisions on balancing absorbing new entrants with promoting the efficient allocation of resources based on the density and age of NHTZs. Finally, this paper meticulously investigates the profound influence and underlying mechanisms of firm density within NHTZs on entrepreneurship. It discerns two distinct mechanisms at play: the legitimacy effect and the impact of excessive competition resulting from firm density. This comprehensive analysis significantly contributes to our comprehension of the intricate interplay between firm density and entrepreneurship, shedding light on the dynamics of competition and mutual benefits.
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