The link between attitude, risk perception, experience and behaviour in Australian general aviation

Abstract

In Australia, the General Aviation (GA) sector exhibits a much poorer safety record than the airline industry; it is responsible for 93% of fatal accidents, whilst representing only 55% of the total flight hours. Leading factors said to account for the high fatality rate in GA include human error and poor decisionâ making; as a result, a concerted effort has been made to improve pilotâ decisionâ making in GA. However, these efforts have not clearly addressed the role of attitudes in effective and safe behaviour (Thomas, 2004). In a similar vein, poor (or inferior) risk perception has been identified as a possible â holeâ in the defence of accidents in the literature (Reason, 1990). Therefore, the main aim of present study was to investigate the link between pilot attitude, risk perception, flight experience and risky flight behaviour. In order to do this, three experiments were undertaken. The first experiment involved the use of a questionnaire designed to investigate the link between pilotsâ attitude, risk perception and experiential data. The second experiment was designed to examine selfâ reported riskâ taking behaviour of pilots. It therefore involved the use of a questionnaire to gather selfâ reports of intended behaviour. The third experiment was designed to investigate flight behaviour in a simulated highâ risk situation and augment this behavioural data with an interview to gain further insight into the causal factors of pilotsâ risk management behaviour. The results revealed that in Australian GA, older pilots, those with more flight hours, or those that fly regularly did not exhibit superior perception of the risks in a given situation than their younger or less experienced counterparts. They did however exhibit lower levels of selfâ confidence (attitude). This finding differs from aviation research undertaken in the United States (Hunter, 2005), where risk perception and attitude were both related to experience. In terms of behaviour, risk perception was found to be the only predictor of effective risk management behaviour. Therefore, holding a â goodâ attitude, or having a higher level of experience appeared to have no influence on the decisions by pilots as to their risk management behaviour. It is important to highlight that the sample in this research is different than that in the US research; the results obtained in this research are based upon a relatively small cohort of pilots that are limited in terms of their experience, age and vocation. Specifically, no airline pilots were included in this study, only General Aviation and trainee pilots were utilised. The generalisability of these results within the wider aviation industry and other domains remains untested.