@article{alsharef_albert_bhandari_2022, title={Safety challenges experienced by driver license examiners and related safety measures}, volume={154}, ISSN={["1879-1042"]}, DOI={10.1016/j.ssci.2022.105808}, abstractNote={Driver license examiners serve as the “gatekeepers” to the world of driving. These examiners administer driving tests and issue driver licenses to prospective drivers that demonstrate driving competency. Unfortunately, this community of workers is vulnerable to experiencing safety incidents as they test prospective drivers with limited driving proficiency. Understanding the safety challenges these workers experience professionally is fundamental to identifying and adopting relevant safety measures. Towards achieving this goal, interviews were conducted with driver license examiners in North Carolina to compile the safety challenges they professionally experience. Additionally, safety management measures that they adopt regularly and others that they recommend for possible future adoption were gathered. The reported safety challenges include prospective drivers reporting for testing and retesting without sufficient training, the existence of communication and language barriers, prospective drivers adopting driving customs learned in other countries, and experiences of entering unclean vehicles. Safety measures that the driver license examiners adopt regularly include the use of widely adopted terms and hand gestures to overcome communication challenges, being prepared to take control over the vehicle steering, encouraging prospective drivers to hold the learner’s permit and gain additional experience, and others. Suggested safety measures for possible future adoption include empowering examiners to terminate the test when appropriate, enforcing a limited wait time following the issuance of a learner’s permit prior to attempting the driving test, and the regular adoption of contactless testing methods popularized during the COVID-19 pandemic. The study findings can be leveraged to enhance the safety of driver license examiners.}, journal={SAFETY SCIENCE}, author={Alsharef, Abdullah and Albert, Alex and Bhandari, Siddharth}, year={2022}, month={Oct} }
 @article{uddin_albert_tamanna_alsharef_2022, title={YouTube as a source of information: early coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic in the context of the construction industry}, volume={12}, ISSN={["1466-433X"]}, DOI={10.1080/01446193.2022.2162096}, abstractNote={Abstract The COVID-19 pandemic has been the largest global crisis in recent decades. Apart from the countless deaths and health emergencies, the pandemic has disrupted several industries—including construction. For example, a significant number of construction projects have been interrupted, delayed, and even abandoned. In such emergencies, information gathering and dissemination are vital for effective crisis management. The role of social media platforms such as YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter, as information sources, in these contexts has received much attention. The purpose of this investigation was to evaluate if YouTube can serve as a useful source of information for the construction industry in emergency situations—such as during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic. The assessment was undertaken by distilling the coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic as it relates to the construction industry from the content shared via YouTube by leveraging Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) topic modelling. The investigation also compared the timeline with which relevant content was shared via YouTube and peer-reviewed research articles to make relative assessments. The findings suggest that YouTube offered significant and relevant coverage across six topics that include health and safety challenges, ongoing construction operation updates, workforce-related challenges, industry operations-related guidelines and advocacy, and others. Moreover, compared to the coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic in the research literature, YouTube offered more comprehensive and timely coverage of the pandemic as it relates to the construction industry. Accordingly, industry stakeholders may leverage YouTube as a valuable and largely untapped resource to aid in combating similar emergency situations.}, journal={CONSTRUCTION MANAGEMENT AND ECONOMICS}, author={Uddin, S. M. Jamil and Albert, Alex and Tamanna, Mahzabin and Alsharef, Abdullah}, year={2022}, month={Dec} }
 @article{fullerton_tamer_banerjee_alsharef_jaselskis_2021, title={Development of North Carolina Department of Transportation's CLEAR Program for Enhanced Project Performance}, volume={2}, ISSN={["2169-4052"]}, url={http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?eid=2-s2.0-85116336814&partnerID=MN8TOARS}, DOI={10.1177/0361198121995195}, abstractNote={ Valuable lessons learned and best practices gleaned from construction projects often do not transfer to future generations because of the lack of a formalized process. This ongoing issue gives rise to the need to impart fresh training to new North Carolina Department of Transportation (NCDOT) employees once the aging workforce retires or in the event of turnover. In addition, a platform for personnel to record pertinent project information about successes and failures in projects is needed. Such information can help solve problems and avoid repeated mistakes. The aim of this research project is to create a new program called Communicate Lessons, Exchange Advice, Record (CLEAR) to reposit knowledge gained by personnel. Integral to this program is an internal-only web-based database on NCDOT’s Connect SharePoint portal with MS Access as its backend. The North Carolina State University researchers used a Design for Six Sigma approach to identify, define, develop, optimize, and verify lessons learned/best practices to create the CLEAR database. The database fields were selected based on end-user input as well as a review of existing data, such as claims and supplemental agreements, within NCDOT data repositories. Training materials, including videos and standard operating procedures, were created to disseminate information about this new program. The CLEAR program will help the NCDOT to institutionalize knowledge and is expected to improve project cost variability and scheduling. }, number={7}, journal={TRANSPORTATION RESEARCH RECORD}, author={Fullerton, Clare E. and Tamer, Alyson W. and Banerjee, Siddharth and Alsharef, Abdullah F. and Jaselskis, Edward J.}, year={2021}, month={Feb} }
 @article{alsharef_banerjee_uddin_albert_jaselskis_2021, title={Early Impacts of the COVID-19 Pandemic on the United States Construction Industry}, volume={18}, ISSN={["1660-4601"]}, url={https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph18041559}, DOI={10.3390/ijerph18041559}, abstractNote={The COVID-19 pandemic has been the largest global health crisis in decades. Apart from the unprecedented number of deaths and hospitalizations, the pandemic has resulted in economic slowdowns, widespread business disruptions, and significant hardships. This study focused on investigating the early impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on the U.S. construction industry since the declaration of the national emergency on 13 March 2020. The study objectives were achieved through 34 telephone interviews with project managers, engineers, designers, and superintendents that represented different states and distinct industry sectors in the United States (U.S.). The interviewees offered information on their experience with the pandemic, including the general and adverse effects experienced, new opportunities created, and risk management efforts being undertaken. The reported adverse effects included significant delays on projects, inability to secure materials on time, reduction in productivity rates, material price escalations, and others. The new opportunities that were created included projects involving the fast-track construction of medical facilities, construction of residential buildings, transportation-related work, and opportunities to recruit skilled workers. The risk management measures that were widely adopted included measures to enhance safety and reduce other project risks. The safety measures adopted included requiring employees to wear cloth face masks, adoption of social distancing protocols, staggering of construction operations, offering COVID-19-related training, administering temperature checks prior to entry into the workplace, and others. Measures to manage other project risks included the formation of a task force team to review the evolving pandemic and offer recommendations, advocating that construction businesses be deemed essential to combat delays and taking advantage of government relief programs. The study findings will be useful to industry stakeholders interested in understanding the early impacts of the pandemic on the construction industry. Industry stakeholders may also build upon the reported findings and establish best practices for continued safe and productive operations.}, number={4}, journal={INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF ENVIRONMENTAL RESEARCH AND PUBLIC HEALTH}, publisher={MDPI AG}, author={Alsharef, Abdullah and Banerjee, Siddharth and Uddin, S. M. Jamil and Albert, Alex and Jaselskis, Edward}, year={2021}, month={Feb} }
 @article{alsharef_albert_uddin_kittur_chavan_jaselskis_2021, title={Work-related safety incidents among driver license examiners}, volume={140}, ISSN={["1879-1042"]}, url={http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ssci.2021.105304}, DOI={10.1016/j.ssci.2021.105304}, abstractNote={Driver license examiners serve as the first line of defense against unsafe drivers and driving practices. Nonetheless, these examiners themselves are exposed to high levels of safety risk as they test new drivers – with limited driving proficiency and experience. A deeper understanding of the safety incidents that driver license examiners experience can inform the development of effective injury prevention policies and interventions. Towards achieving this goal, the current study focused on performing exploratory content analyses of safety incident reports maintained by the North Carolina Division of Motor Vehicles (NCDMV) that involved driver license examiners. Apart from demonstrating that numerous incidents are experienced during driving tests, the five key findings include the following: (1) The most common event types that driver license examiners experience are collision with fixed object, overexertion and physical bodily reaction, and collision with another vehicle; (2) The most common contributing factors are failure to maintain control of vehicle and incidents experienced while examiners are exiting the vehicle; (3) Most incidents that result in injury involve injuries to multiple body parts, followed by injuries to the back, leg, and neck; (4) The most common injury types are strain, sprain, and bruising and contusion; (5) The injury outcomes are medical case, permanent disability, report only, and temporary disability. The results also reveal particular relationships that are overrepresented in the incident reports. For example, collision with fixed object is associated particularly with failure to maintain control of vehicle. The findings can inform future efforts that seek to reduce injury rates among driver license examiners.}, journal={SAFETY SCIENCE}, publisher={Elsevier BV}, author={Alsharef, Abdullah and Albert, Alex and Uddin, S. M. Jamil and Kittur, Nikhil Basavaraj and Chavan, Sampada and Jaselskis, Edward}, year={2021}, month={Aug} }
 @article{chowdhury_zhu_rasoulkhani_mostafavi_jaselskis_stoa_li_banerjee_alsharef_brannen_2020, title={Guidelines for Robust Adaptation to Environmental Regulations in Infrastructure Projects}, volume={146}, ISBN={1943-7862}, url={https://doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)CO.1943-7862.0001908}, DOI={10.1061/(ASCE)CO.1943-7862.0001908}, abstractNote={AbstractEnvironmental regulations can greatly affect the operation of new and existing infrastructure projects. In fact, the economic performance of infrastructure projects is closely related to en...}, number={10}, journal={JOURNAL OF CONSTRUCTION ENGINEERING AND MANAGEMENT}, publisher={American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE)}, author={Chowdhury, Sudipta and Zhu, Jin and Rasoulkhani, Kambiz and Mostafavi, Ali and Jaselskis, Edward and Stoa, Ryan and Li, Qingchun and Banerjee, Siddharth and Alsharef, Abdullah and Brannen, Laura}, year={2020}, pages={04020121} }
 @article{uddin_albert_alsharef_pandit_patil_nnaji_2020, title={Hazard Recognition Patterns Demonstrated by Construction Workers}, volume={17}, ISSN={["1660-4601"]}, url={http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17217788}, DOI={10.3390/ijerph17217788}, abstractNote={Construction workers fail to recognize a large number of safety hazards. These unrecognized safety hazards can lead to unintended hazard exposure and tragic safety incidents. Unfortunately, traditional hazard recognition interventions (e.g., job hazard analyses and safety training) have been unable to tackle the industry-wide problem of poor hazard recognition levels. In fact, emerging evidence has demonstrated that traditional hazard recognition interventions have been designed without a proper understanding of the challenges workers experience during hazard recognition efforts. Interventions and industry-wide efforts designed based on a more thorough understanding of these challenges can yield substantial benefits—including superior hazard recognition levels and lower injury rates. Towards achieving this goal, the current investigation focused on identifying hazard categories that workers are more proficient in recognizing and others that they are less proficient in recognizing (i.e., hazard recognition patterns). For the purpose of the current study, hazards were classified on the basis of the energy source per Haddon’s energy release theory (e.g., gravity, motion, electrical, chemical, etc.). As part of the study, 287 workers representing 57 construction workplaces in the United States were engaged in a hazard recognition activity. Apart from confirming previous research findings that workers fail to recognize a disproportionate number of safety hazards, the results demonstrate that the workers are more proficient in recognizing certain hazard types. More specifically, the workers on average recognized roughly 47% of the safety hazards in the gravity, electrical, motion, and temperature hazard categories while only recognizing less than 10% of the hazards in the pressure, chemical, and radiation hazard categories. These findings can inform the development of more robust interventions and industry-wide initiatives to tackle the issue of poor hazard recognition levels in the construction industry.}, number={21}, journal={INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF ENVIRONMENTAL RESEARCH AND PUBLIC HEALTH}, publisher={MDPI AG}, author={Uddin, S. M. Jamil and Albert, Alex and Alsharef, Abdullah and Pandit, Bhavana and Patil, Yashwardhan and Nnaji, Chukwuma}, year={2020}, month={Nov} }
 @article{li_brannen_rasoulkhani_mostafavi_stoa_chowdhury_alsharef_banerjee_zhu_jaselskis_2020, title={Regulatory Adaptation in the Construction Industry: Case Study of the OSHA Update to the Respirable Crystalline Silica Standard}, volume={12}, ISSN={["1943-4170"]}, url={http://dx.doi.org/10.1061/(asce)la.1943-4170.0000424}, DOI={10.1061/(ASCE)LA.1943-4170.0000424}, abstractNote={AbstractThis paper presents a case study of a proposed regulatory future-proofing framework for the construction industry. The update to the crystalline silica standard by the Occupational Safety a...}, number={4}, journal={JOURNAL OF LEGAL AFFAIRS AND DISPUTE RESOLUTION IN ENGINEERING AND CONSTRUCTION}, author={Li, Qingchun and Brannen, Laura and Rasoulkhani, Kambiz and Mostafavi, Ali and Stoa, Ryan and Chowdhury, Sudipta and Alsharef, Abdullah and Banerjee, Siddharth and Zhu, Jin and Jaselskis, Edward}, year={2020}, month={Nov} }