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Human Behavior ​

This page covers Task A. Effects of Human Behavior and Communication on the Learning Process from the FAA-S-ACS-25 Flight Instructor for Airplane Category Airman Certification Standards.

Elements of Human Behavior ​

Definitions of Human Behavior ​

Behavior

The product of factors that cause people to act in predictable ways.

  • The study of human behavior is an attempt to explain how and why humans function the way they do.
  • Behavior is also defined as the result of attempts to satisfy certain needs
  • Another definition focuses on the typical life course of humans, emphasizing human development or the successive phases of growth in which human behavior is characterized by a distinct set of physical, physiological, and behavioral features.
  • By observing human behavior, an instructor can gain the knowledge needed to better understand him or herself as an instructor as well as the learning needs of learners. Understanding human behavior leads to successful instruction.

Instructor and Learner Relationship ​

  • Everyone also has an individual style of learning
  • Personality type influence how one teaches and learns
  • Learners whose styles are compatible with the teaching styles of an instructor tend to retain information longer, apply it more effectively, learn more, and have a more positive attitude toward the course in general

TIP

Instructors should understand the learning style of their student and attempt to match their teaching style.

Motivation ​

  • Motivation
    • The reason one acts or behaves in a certain way and lies at the heart of goals.
    • CFI's job is to discover what motivates each learner and to use this information to encourage him or her to work hard.
    • Possibly the most important force which governs the individual's progress and ability to learn
  • Positive motivation
    • Provided by the promise or achievement of rewards
    • Can be subtle and difficult to identify
    • Works better than negative motivation
  • Practice positive feedback frequently by
    • Praising incremental successes during training
    • Relating daily accomplishments to lesson objectives
    • Commenting favorably on learner progress and level ability
  • CFI should ensure that the learner is aware of how early learnings are important for success later so they are motivated.
  • Important for CFI to determine why a learner enrolled in the course to understand their motivation.
  • When motivation drops it is often helpful to remind learners of their own stated goals for seeking aviation training.
  • Tangible motivation
    • The learner must believe their efforts will be rewarded in a definitive and tangible manner
  • Negative motivations
    • Fear and anxiety
    • Reproof and threats
    • May be useful for overconfidence and impulsiveness
  • Learner traits
    • Committed to goals and motivated
    • Self-direction and self-control
    • Responsible
    • Work ethic
    • Imaginative, creative
  • Best way to keep learner motivated is to tell them where they are going and remind of benefits
  • Clearly explain whys and rewards of lesson
  • Minimizes insecurity and anxiety
  • Approach learners as individuals
  • Give credit where and when due

Human Needs ​

  • Maslow's heirarchy of human needs (PSSES)
    • Physiological
      • Basic survival needs
      • Biological needs such as food and water
    • Safety and security
      • Need to feel safe to be able to learn
    • Social
      • Love and belongingness
    • Egoistic
      • Healthy self esteem, self confidence, independence, recognition
      • Need for prestige and feeling of accomplishment
    • Self-actualization
      • Self-fulfillment
      • Realizing own potential (be all you can be)
    • Listed from the based of the pyramid on up
    • Lower levels need to be satisfied first
    • Once a need is satisfied it no longer provides motivation
    • Then will try to fulfill a higher level need

Defense mechanisms ​

Defense Mechanisms

Subconscious ego-protecting reactions to unpleasant situations.

  • Can be biological or psychological
  • Can involve self-deception and distortion of reality
  • Fight or flight response
  • CFI needs to recognize apprehension and help learner gain skills to feel comfortable
  • Defense mechanisms share two common properties:
    • They often appear unconsciously.
    • They tend to distort, transform, or otherwise falsify reality.
  • Denial and repression are two primary defense mechanisms, with others including but not limited to the following. (DR CPR DR F)
    • Denial
      • Refusal to accept external reality because it is too threatening
      • A form of repression
      • Ignores the problem
      • "My landings are fine, landing half way down the runway is no big deal."
    • Repression
      • When a person places uncomfortable thoughts into inaccessible areas of the unconscious mind.
      • For example, after the CFI recovers the airplane from an inadvertent spin, the student might not be able to recall any memory of the event.
    • Compensation
      • Psychologically counterbalancing perceived weaknesses by emphasizing strength in other areas
      • "Maybe I was off course, but I held altitude like a pro and you know it!"
    • Projection
      • Relegating blame for personal shortcomings, mistakes, and transgressions to others
      • "My landing was bad because my instructor had me land on a runway I've never landed on before"
    • Reaction Formation
      • Faking of a belief opposite to the true belief because the true belief causes anxiety
      • "I don't care what people think of me..." when really they are lonely and long for acceptance.
    • Displacement
      • Unconscious shift of emotion, affect, or desire from the original object to a more acceptable, less threatening substitute
      • For example get mad at something else instead of instructor
    • Rationalization
      • Subconscious technique for justifying actions that otherwise would be unacceptable
      • Making excuses
      • Learner cannot accept real reasons for their behavior
      • Might be the first defense mechanism we will see as CFI
      • "I am a very safe pilot, it's the examiner's fault that he doesn't see that."
    • Fantasy (Daydreaming)
      • When a learner engages in daydreams about how things should be rather than doing anything about how things are
      • A mental escape from frustrating situations
      • For example dreaming of being a successful airline pilot rather than actually committing to the hard work required to reach that goal.

Learner Emotional Reactions ​

  • Student emotional reactions (AIWA PNAF) - obstacles to learning
    • Anxiety
    • Impatience
    • Worry or lack of interest
    • Apathy due to inadequate instruction
    • Physical Discomfort, Illness, Fatigue, and Dehydration

Anxiety and Stress ​

Anxiety ​

Anxiety

Anxiety is a feeling of worry, nervousness, or unease, often about something that is going to happen.

  • Whether response to anxiety is normal or abnormal, it's important to deal with
  • Can be countered by reinforcing the learners' enjoyment of flying and by teaching them to cope with their fears
  • Can be minimized throughout training by emphasizing the benefits and pleasurable experiences that can be derived from flying, rather than by continuously citing the unhappy consequences of faulty performances
  • Most significant psychological factor that affects flight instruction

Stress ​

Stress

Stress is the body's response to demands placed upon it.

  • Normal Reactions to Stress
    • Rational thinking
    • Correct, rapid responses
    • Extreme sensitivity to surroundings
  • Abnormal Reactions to Stress
    • Innapropriate laughter/singing
    • Extreme overcooperation
    • Inadequate or absent response
    • Mood changes
    • Aggression towards instructor

Impatience ​

  • Present training one step at a time with clear goal at each step
  • Especially for motivated, fast learners, advance as soon as goal has been attained
  • A greater deterrent to learning pilot skills than is generally recognized

Worry or Lack of Interest ​

  • Worries can come from outside and need to be recognized
  • Worries about flight training should be addressed

Physical Discomfort, Illness, Fatigue, and Dehydration ​

  • Slows the rate of learning
  • Minor illness affects performance
  • Airsickness can develop immunity quickly, and less likely to be airsick when occupied and operating controls
  • Acute fatigue, a normal occurrence of everyday living, is the tiredness felt after long periods of physical and mental strain
    • Characterized by errors in timing and neglect of secondary tasks
  • CFI should detect fatigue and associated deterioration of performance
  • Chronic fatigue is not enough time to recover from repeated acute fatigue, and may have deeper points or origin e.g. financial stress
    • Defined as a combination of both physiological problems and psychological issues
    • Evidenced by acceptance of unwarranted risks
  • Dehydration and heatstroke symptoms are fatigue
  • Acute
    • Irritable
    • Neglecting tasks
    • Distraction
    • Inattentiveness
    • Error accumulation
  • Chronic
    • Physiological problems
    • Psychological stress
    • Learner taking unwarranted risks
    • To deal with reduce or remove underlying problems

Apathy Due to Inadequate Instruction ​

  • Or inadequate preparation
  • CFI needs to be prepared to prevent learner from being apathetic
  • To be effective, CFI teaches for the level of the learner
  • Poor instruction can be for other reasons than poor preparation

Teaching the Adult Learner ​

  • The average aviation learner age is 30 years old
  • Adults are autonomous and self-directed; they need to be independent and exercise control.
  • Adults have accumulated a foundation of life experiences and knowledge and draw upon this reservoir of experience for learning.
  • Adults are goal-oriented.
  • Adults are relevancy oriented.
    • Their time perspective changes from one of postponed knowledge application to immediate application.
  • Adults are practical, focusing on the aspects of a lesson most useful to them in their work.
  • Instructors should
    • Provide a training syllabus that is organized with clearly defined course objectives to show the learner how the training helps him or her attain specific goals
    • Help learners integrate new ideas with what they already know to ensure they keep and use the new information.
    • Assume responsibility only for his or her own expectations, not for those of learners. It is important to clarify and articulate all learner expectations early on.
    • Recognize the learner's need to control pace and start/stop time.
    • Take advantage of the adult preference to self-direct and self-design learning projects by giving the learner frequent scenario based training (SBT) opportunities
    • Refrain from "spoon-feeding" the learner.

Effective Communication ​

  • Use a varied approach
  • Consider learners abilities, attitudes, and experiences
  • Effectiveness is measured by the similarity of the idea transmitted and the idea received
  • Barriers

Basic Elements of Communication ​

  • Basic three elements of communication (SSR)
    • Source
      • Need to communicate in a way that can be understood (no undefined acronyms)
      • Remember unconscious communication (e.g. confidence)
      • Use up-to-date and stimulating material
    • Symbols
      • Example: can tell student how trim works, or rotate trim wheel while student maintains level flight so they can feel it
      • CFI should constantly monitor feedback from the learner in order to identify misunderstandings and adjust
      • Use positive feedback
    • Receiver
      • Communication succeeds only in relation to the reaction of the receivers
      • Three characteristics of receivers need to be understood: abilities, attitudes, and experiences
        • Abilities - e.g. how familiar learner is with aviation, their viewpoint, and background
        • Attitudes - should be molded into forms that promote reception of information
        • Experiences - in aviation usually are adult learners that bring significant experiences they can draw from

Barriers to Effective Communication ​

  • Barriers to effective communication (COILE)
    • Confusion Between the Symbol and the Symbolized Object
      • To communicate effectively, speakers and writers should account for possible misinterpretation
      • Words and symbols can then be chosen to represent what the speaker or writer intends
      • Example: fly the verb and fly the insect
    • Overuse of Abstractions
      • Be specific and generally avoid abstractions
      • Aircraft is less specific than airplane and could mean blimp
      • Airplane is less specific than Cessna and could mean A380
    • Interference
      • Interference occurs when the message gets disrupted, truncated, or added to somewhere in the communication sequence e.g. noise
      • Additional feedback and confirmation reduce potential harmful effects from interference
      • e.g. the electricity going out in the building, the student losing their hearing, catching the flu
    • Lack of common experience
      • Between the communicator (instructor) and the receiver (learner) is probably the greatest single barrier to effective communication
      • Will take time before the student can understand the perspective of the instructor
    • External Factors
      • These factors may include physiological, environmental, and psychological elements To communicate effectively, the instructor should consider the effects of these factors and mitigate them where possible
      • e.g. attempt to accommodate learning for physical injury

Developing Communication Skills ​

  • Developing communication skills (RILQI)

    • Role Playing
      • Learner is provided with a general description of a situation and then applies a new skill or knowledge to perform the role
      • e.g. CFI learner flies with another CFI who plays role of student pilot
      • Need to think it terms of SBT
    • Instructional Communication
      • Instructors perform better when speaking of something they know very well and for which they have a high level of confidence
      • The instructor should not be afraid to use examples of past experiences to illustrate particular points
      • The aviation learner should know how and why something should be done before doing it
    • Listening
      • Listening is "hearing with comprehension."
      • Certain emotions interfere with how learners listen
      • A listener should always ask, what is the purpose of what I am listening to? By doing this, the listener can relate the words to the overall concept.
      • Learning can take notes
      • Know your students before teaching them. Listening goes both ways, both instructor and student need to want to listen to each other.
    • Questioning
      • Good questioning can determine how well the learner understands what is being taught
      • Focused questions allow the instructor to concentrate on desired areas
      • Open-ended and closed-ended questions can both be used
      • Effective questions are adapted to the learner
    • Instructional Enhancement
      • CFI should continue develop their skills well above the level of material they are teaching.
      • As an instructor: never stop learning

  • Flight Instructor Actions Regarding Seriously Abnormal Learners

    • If CFI thinks learner has disqualifying psychological abnormality, another CFI should do an evaluation flight
    • If action is justified, refrain from further instruction or endorsements

  • Instructor should help learner deal with stress

    • Treat learners fears as normal
    • Methodical training in emergency operations

  • Overlearning

    • May result in an undesirable automatic response
    • e.g. landing gear up even after gear down checklist was "completed"

References ​