Search results

The purpose of this study is to explore the impact of asymmetric trust on construction project management performance in China's construction industry. Moreover, the authors explore the mediating role of two types of knowledge sharing (explicit knowledge sharing and tacit knowledge sharing) in explaining the association between asymmetric trust and project management performance.

A theoretical model based on the research hypotheses proposed in this study was developed and a questionnaire survey was conducted with 271 professionals. The data collected was analyzed by the structural equation modeling (SEM) technique.

The results of this study indicate that there is a significant and negative association between asymmetric trust and project management performance. Moreover, two types of knowledge sharing (explicit knowledge sharing and tacit knowledge sharing) have different degrees of impact on improving project management performance. In addition, tacit knowledge sharing is a mediator between asymmetric trust and project management performance.

The data used in this study is from Chinese scenarios, so the research conclusions and application effects based on this are bound to have certain regional limitations. Besides, there are many factors that affect project management performance improving, and the relationships among them are so complex. The theoretical model proposed in this study may not be fully considered. Therefore, follow-up researchers can consider bringing more suitable variables into their researches, so that the theoretical researches can be more in line with the actual project management practice, and the specific mechanism for improving project management performance can be explained more deeply.

This research's value is as follows: Firstly, this paper contributes to the trust and relational governance literature by expanding the research perspective of mutual trust to asymmetric trust. Specially, this research designs a measurement scale for asymmetric trust and then reveals the impact mechanism of it on project management performance, which will certainly promote research paradigm change of trust. Secondly, this research is beneficial to knowledge sharing literature in the construction management field by expanding the research scope of knowledge sharing from a cross-organizational perspective.

This research aims to propose a model for the complex decision-making involved in the ecological restoration of mega-infrastructure (e.g. railway engineering). This model is based on multi-source heterogeneous data and will enable stakeholders to solve practical problems in decision-making processes and prevent delayed responses to the demand for ecological restoration.

Based on the principle of complexity degradation, this research collects and brings together multi-source heterogeneous data, including meteorological station data, remote sensing image data, railway engineering ecological risk text data and ecological restoration text data. Further, this research establishes an ecological restoration plan library to form input feature vectors. Random forest is used for classification decisions. The ecological restoration technologies and restoration plant species suitable for different regions are generated.

This research can effectively assist managers of mega-infrastructure projects in making ecological restoration decisions. The accuracy of the model reaches 0.83. Based on the natural environment and construction disturbances in different regions, this model can determine suitable types of trees, shrubs and herbs for planting, as well as the corresponding ecological restoration technologies needed.

Managers should pay attention to the multiple types of data generated in different stages of megaproject and identify the internal relationships between these multi-source heterogeneous data, which provides a decision-making basis for complex management decisions. The coupling between ecological restoration technologies and restoration plant species is also an important factor in improving the efficiency of ecological compensation.

Unlike previous studies, which have selected a typical section of a railway for specialized analysis, the complex decision-making model for ecological restoration proposed in this research has wider geographical applicability and can better meet the diverse ecological restoration needs of railway projects that span large regions.

Flow force is one of the crucial factors affecting the performance of conical throttle valves. The purpose of this paper is to determine the relationship between the flow force and operating parameters of the conical throttle valve.

The flow force of the throttle valve can be obtained by the difference between the axial force and static pressure on the valve spool. In this paper, the internal fluid is divided into two regions and the axial force and static pressure are obtained, respectively. In addition, a two-dimensional axisymmetric simulation model and experimental test are carried out to validate the results of the flow force.

It can be seen that the theoretical, simulation and experimental results exhibit high agreement with each other and the error between them decreases with the increase in the size of the opening. The curves of pressure distribution reveal that the pressure on the spool first decreases then increases when it reaches the minimum pressure at the orifice. Additionally, the minimum pressure decreases with the increase of opening and pressure difference. The results also indicate that the increase in the size of the opening and inlet pressure has a positive effect on the flow force. However, the increase in outlet pressure has a negative effect on the flow force.

In this paper, the flow force calculation model of conical throttle valve is established and the influence of operating parameters on the flow force of conical throttle valve is studied.

During the service period of communication satellite systems, their performance is often degraded due to the depletion mechanism. In this paper, the grey system theory is applied to the multi-state system effectiveness evaluation and the grey Lz-transformation ADC (availability, dependability and capability) effectiveness evaluation model is constructed to address the characteristics of the communication satellite system such as different constituent subsystems, numerous states and the inaccuracy and insufficiency of data.

The model is based on the ADC effectiveness evaluation method, combined with the Lz transformation and uses the definite weighted function of the three-parameter interval grey number as a bridge to incorporate the possibility of system performance being greater than the task demand into the effectiveness solution algorithm. At the same time, using MATLAB (Matrix laboratory) to solve each state probability, the same performance level in the Lz transform is combined. Then, the system effectiveness is obtained by Python.

The results show that the G-Lz-ADC model constructed in this paper can accurately evaluate the effectiveness of static/dynamic systems and certain/uncertain system and also has better applicability in evaluating the effectiveness of the multi-state complex system.

The G-Lz-ADC effectiveness evaluation model constructed in this paper can effectively reduce the complexity of traditional effectiveness evaluation models by combining the same performance levels in the Lz-transform and solving the effectiveness of the system with the help of computer programming, providing a new method for the effectiveness evaluation of the complex MSS. At the same time, the weaknesses of the system can be identified, providing a theoretical basis for improving the system’s effectiveness.

The possibility solution method based on the definite weighted function comparing the two three-parameter interval grey numbers is constructed, which compensates for the traditional calculation of the probability based on numerical values and subjective preferences of decision-makers. Meanwhile, the effectiveness evaluation model integrates the basic theories of three-parameter interval grey number and its definite weighted function, Grey−Markov, grey universal generating function (GUGF), grey multi-state system (GMSS), etc., which is an innovative method to solve the effectiveness of a multi-state instantaneous communication satellite system.

This paper delineates a literature review on fire-induced progressive collapse on structures and the effect of high temperature on structures and elements. After the occurrences of fire in the World Trade Center in the USA, the researchers started concentrating on the progressive collapse that happens due to high temperature. Currently, most of the researchers are working on fire-induced progressive collapse on structures using high-temperature behavior on materials which are used for construction. The researchers have been doing an intensive study to find a better strategy to prevent the building from structural fire damage or collapse with available codes and guidelines throughout the world. This paper aims to provide a better understanding and analytical solutions on the basis of the recent works done by researchers in fire-induced progressive collapse and methods adopted to find the collapse mechanism.

This paper is written by studying different literature papers of 109 related to progressive collapse on structures and fire-induced progressive collapse.

The behavior of structures due to high temperature and collapse conditions due to fire in different scenarios is identified.

This paper fulfills an identified need to study how the structure can withstand high-temperature conditions in our day-to-day lives.

The purpose of this paper is to analyse the policy instruments used by the China's Government on prefabricated construction (PC) development, with the aim to clarify the pattern and discover the focus of the policy instruments using the methods of bibliometric analysis and content analysis.

Through a thorough screening by all researchers, 25 policies were identified from 1995 to 2021 were selected and analysed. The external attribute analysis clarified the issuing year, organisation, and the format of each policy. The content analysis was adopted firstly to analyse the policy instrument. An analysis framework including environmental instruments, supply instruments and demand instruments was applied in categorising and counting of each policy instrument. The bibliometric analysis was then carried out to extract keywords of the policy instruments, construct a co-word network and complete the cluster analysis.

The results indicate that the policies lack consistency and had relatively low authority. The results of content analysis show that the policy system relies heavily on environmental and supply instruments, whilst the use of demand instruments seems to be grossly inadequate. The results of the bibliometric analysis identify the core ideas of each policy instrument category, discuss the existing problems and then put forward the corresponding countermeasures.

This study comprehensively and systematically analysed the policy instruments on facilitating the development of PC in China which broaden the research perspectives of the PC development by introducing the methods of political science. The research findings afford helpful information for future policy adjustments and elucidate the effective delivery of policies to facilitate PC development for developing countries.

This study provides an in-depth understanding of policy instruments used by China's Government on PC development. By integrating the policy instrument analysis framework into the mixed methods of content analysis and bibliometric analysis, this study provides an innovative way to conduct policy instrument analysis.