Emerging Trends of Safe Working Conditions in the Construction Industry: A Bibliometric Approach

Abstract

The construction industry has been slow to implement safe working conditions, even though it could reduce the risks and dangers that the industry’s operations pose to human health and safety. More research and development in this area is clearly needed to increase the acceptance of safety in the execution of engineering projects, as previous study has demonstrated. Therefore, this study will analyse safe working conditions in construction-related professions in order to determine the focal area of previous studies. However, there has not been much effort put into mapping international studies on safe working environments in the construction industry. This research evaluates safety for the construction industry in order to discover new research trends. This indicates the ongoing challenges in the sector. For this study, comprehensive bibliometric methodology was applied, and data were extracted from the Scopus database. Using keywords like “safe”, “working condition”, “construction industry” or “built environment”, “health and safety”, and “technology”, publications from the database were extracted. Based on the collected bibliographic information, a co-authorship and co-occurrence map was created using VOSviewer. Research on occupational health and safety in the building industry, safety management and risk factors in the construction industry, ethical considerations in human experimentation, and safety and work environment revealed an emerging trend in safe working conditions in the construction industry.