Abstract
In general aviation, 85% of the crashes seem to be caused by pilots' errors (CitationLi, Baker, Grabowski, & Rebok, 2001) and 46% of the crashes occur at airports (CitationLi & Baker, 1999). It is important to determine if the same factors influence the flying performance and the landing decision making and to uncover which factors, among the pilot's cognitive status, personality traits, and experience, are the most predictive. We examined in 24 general aviation pilots the relationship between those factors and the flying performance and weather-related decision-making relevance. The cognitive assessment encompassed the three basic executive functions (CitationMiyake et al., 2000), reasoning, and psychomotor velocity. The personal characteristics were age, flight experience, and level of impulsivity. Reasoning, updating in working memory, and flight experience were predictive of the flight performance. In addition, updating in working memory, flight experience, and level of impulsivity were linked with weather-related decision-making relevance.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
We wish to thank the Lasbordes Airfield ISAE staff. The study was supported by a “Gis Longévité” grant, and the Midi-Pyrenees Regional Council Grants 03012000 and 05006110.
Notes
1Crosswind (in knots) = effective wind (in knots) * sin (angle between runway and wind direction). Moreover, pilots have mnemonic methods to simplify this calculation.