A study on the student pilot's mental workload due to personality types of both instructor and student

Abstract

The main purpose of this paper is to provide the ideal flight crew combination for instructor and student pilots in order to enhance the flight training effects based on Myers Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) theory. In addition to personality, various levels of flight difficulty are considered in order to investigate their potential interaction effect in terms of student pilots' mental workload measured in heart rate, altitude deviation, NASA-TLX (Task Load Index) and subjective degree of personality harmony. Based on an experiment performed in a real flight situation, we found significant effects of personality combinations in terms of all four outcome measures. Both group C types of instructors and students who are concrete, realistic and have mechanical skills turn out to be the ideal flight crew combination. A structural equation model, fitted to analyse causality among the four response variables, implied that as the heart rate increased, the altitude deviation increased. In addition, as the altitude deviation and personality harmony increased, NASA-TLX increased. The results of this study are expected to provide a theoretical basis for manning the flight crew combinations and thereby enhancing the efficiency of flight training.