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Arthur, A C (2016) The impact of systems differentiation and affect heuristics in intuitive construction risk management decision making systems, Unpublished PhD Thesis, Bartlett School of Construction and Project Management, University College London.

  • Type: Thesis
  • Keywords: decision making; heuristic; project team; psychology; risk identification; risk management; roles
  • ISBN/ISSN:
  • URL: https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1495997/
  • Abstract:
    The existing theoretical evidence of intuitive dominated construction risk management practices (Akintoye and Macleod, 1997; Lyons and Skitmore, 2004; Kululanga and Kuotcha, 2010), suggests corresponding reliance on psychological stimulus in the decision making processes (Slovic et al, 2003). The prevailing construction management research publications however appear limited in exploring the psychology behind the intuitive risk identification and treatment processes. The purpose of this study therefore was to address the resulting data gap by drawing upon theories from systems thinking and behavioural science in examining the behavioural patterns of intuitive construction risk management decision making systems, in the context of the sources and structure of risk perceptions, and the psychological issues involved in mixing tools and techniques from different systems of thinking and decision making. The empirical findings from a four case qualitative research methodology have revealed substantial evidence in support of the three research theoretical propositions: risk perception categorisation within the construction project delivery system reflecting the structure of the differentiated specialist roles; psychological difficulties associated with intuitive risk identification of events outside the scope of our heuristics; incompatibilities of mixing decision processing approaches and data presentation formats from different systems of thinking and decision making. The study has also made recommendations for future research including, empirical investigations to test the sensitivity of the other sources of affective heuristics including, personal; project; organisational; and industrial experiences; in influencing risk perception categorisation; empirical studies to critically map out the heuristics boundaries of the different specialist roles, and also to develop a model for identifying the heuristics indicators for a construction project to ensure compatibility in the affective specialist-role stimulus of project team members and their specific project context; empirical investigations into the appropriate qualitative data presentation formats which will be compatible with the prevailing intuitive construction risk management practices.