Pilot Judgment: Training and Evaluation

Abstract

An analysis of accident statistics reveals that over 50% of pilot-caused civil aviation accident fatalities are the result of faulty pilot judgment. Although the FAA requires examiners to evaluate pilot judgment, it provides no definition or criteria against which such an evaluation can be made. In spite of the statistics implicating pilot judgment in many aviation fatalities, attempts to teach it are almost nonexistent. It is but a slight overstatement to say that good pilot judgment is learned by the lucky and the cautious over many years of varied flying experiences. This paper examines some of the decision-research literature in an attempt to provide an operational definition of pilot judgment and to suggest ways that pilot judgment may be taught and evaluated in civil aviation.

Towards a practical model of cognitive/information processing task analysis and schema acquisition for complex problem-solving situations

“…These levels lie on a continuum ranging from the perceptual-motor domain (aircraft control) to overall mission planning and execution. Jensen (1982) proposed a similar continuum, and suggested that the two ends of the continuum differ in cognitive complexity and decision-making time. At either end of the continuum, inferring the wrong meaning from a correctly identified stimulus event may lead to a deterioration of performance.…”

“…The hypotheses and inferences may not be correct, but without a systematic progression of problem situations containing feedback, one may never detect the incorrect inferences until the student makes an observable error. A similar problem exists with systems such as computer-based instruction when the only feedback that the student receives is a simple "right" or "wrong" (Jensen, 1982). The student needs to know why a particular response was correct orparticularly -incorrect (in terms of the schema) and not only that it was correct or incorrect.…”

Aircrew Emergency Decisions: Analysis of Cue Factors for USE IN Synthetic Learning Environments.

“…SET can involve training in advanced simulators in addition to mock-ups or simple" procedural trainers, with the introduction of additional realism and stress, and with the potential for simulating adverse outcomes. Jensen (1978) discusses the evaluation of aircrew decision skills under the heading of judgment. Jenson (1978) defines judgment in terms of discriminative judgments and response selection tendencies in a manner similar to Sidorsky and Simoneau (1979).…”

“…Pretraining evaluation has to do with the screening and selection of those individuals with the highest potential for successful decision making. As Jensen (1978) indicates, little has been done in this area although psychometric assessments of risk-taking behavior may hold some promise for this area.…”

Personality and Hazardous Judgment Patterns Within A Student Civil Aviation Population

“…Subsequent research has addressed the importance of pilot judgment training and potential approaches to its application within various operational settings (Jensen, 1982;Jensen & Benel, 1977). The encouraging results obtained by researchers studying the effects of judgment training upon the incidence of pilot decisional errors (Berlin et al, 1982;Buch & Diehl, 1984) underscore the importance of further research in this area.…”