Promotion of diffusion of innovation: A study of BIM adoption in construction industries

Productivity improvement potentials by adopting Building Information Modelling (BIM) are already well established. In fact, the benefits of BIM adoption are not limited to higher productivity. While there are clear and well-established benefits, the 'natural diffusion' of BIM in construction industries is low. The critical shortfall in BIM adoption rates between regular construction industries compared to those with 'mandated diffusion' of BIM like that of the United Kingdom is clear evidence for this hindrance. Poor rates of adoption lead to a loss in receiving potential benefits brought in by BIM. In this paper, we first show that theories of diffusion of innovations (DOI) clarify how such poor adoption rates occur but that they fail to fully explain why such hindrance occur. This gap in knowledge, in fact is a major barrier in promoting successful BIM diffusion because it limits the rationality of management strategies. This primary gap can be narrowed down to limited knowledge on how 'spatial characteristics' and features of BIM artefacts affect the adopter decision. Affordance is a concept used to explain how such features define possible uses of BIM or how BIM can be used. Several Affordance related theories were found to be able to bridge Affordance with DOI from knowledge, behavioural, social and technological perspectives. In this paper, through a critical review of literature we present a theoretical framework that can be used to analyse and explain how BIM affordances affect the diffusion of BIM. The application of this framework can help in devising strategic packaging of BIM that can effectively promote its natural diffusion. The framework is also usable in many other contexts where the diffusion of technological innovations is studied.