Towards an Integrated Framework for Information Exchange Network of Construction Projects

The application of building information modeling (BIM) disrupts the interaction between individuals and industry organizations from time and spatial dimensions. However, the temporal dimension of interaction is usually a neglected factor in the application of social network analysis (SNA) when studying the project communication networks. Additionally, the social incorporation of BIM enables full collaboration across multiple disciplines and stakeholders, which calls for multi-dimensional research agendas and practice of different network models. To fill the gap, this study aims to develop an integrated framework to guide the analysis of information exchange in construction projects. According to the findings, three network models can be used for network analysis at the industry, project and individual levels. It is worth noting that the majority of recent attention about the project communication networks has been focused on industry and project levels. The network analysis at the individual level is under-researched so we actively explore how to extend the scope of the network analysis from the project and industry level to the individual level. An ego network model was thus proposed to explore the project communication networks at the individual level, where the network indices were derived. The outputs implied that the proposed model has the potential to explore the ego-centric network in the construction projects.

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