Cognition, Assessment and Debriefing in Aviation

Debriefing is a major component of the job in many high-risk industries where errors can have considerable, often deadly consequences, including combat, surgery, and aviation. Although there exists considerable literature on debriefing, recent reviews of the literature suggest (a) shortcomings in the topics researched, (b) paucity of related theory, (c) limitations in the number of empirical studies, and (d) problems in research design. There are also recent suggestions that "there are surprisingly studies in the scholarly literature that show how to debrief, how to teach or learn to debrief, what methods of debriefing exists and how effective they are at achieving learning objectives and goals" Meta-analyses reveal substantial variations in research findings—e.g., on the use of video as a means of debriefing—that can be traced to the problems.

This book redresses these problems in that it provides a detailed look at debriefing and assessment, the functions of different cognitive artifacts used, and a theoretical framework that accounts for the complexity of flying an aircraft and for the debriefing of the pilots’ experiences, especially under the high-stakes condition of their bi-annual evaluation for licensing purposes. The book provides detailed investigation of flight examiners’ methods to arrive at assessments of aviation pilot performance. It shows and theoretically models why there are good reasons for lower than desired inter-rater agreements. It offers detailed scenarios of how debriefing can be made to draw maximum benefit for pilot learning, that is, for the take-home messages that will make them better pilots. The theoretical framework includes objective factors that determine performance and the subjective experience pilots have while undergoing training and testing in flight simulators

Wolff-Michael Roth has obtained a M.Sc. (physics) from the University of Wurzburg (Germany), and a Ph.D. on a topic in cognitive development from the College of Science and Technology at the University of Southern Mississippi. He also holds a specialization in statistics for the social sciences. He taught school science in the 1980s, then taught statistics in the Faculty of Education at Simon Fraser University (Vancouver, Canada) before assuming the (endowed) Lansdowne Chair of Applied Cognitive Science at the University of Victoria.

Over the years, he has received many awards for best papers and books, early career awards, and a culminating lifetime achievement award from the National Association for Research in Science Teaching. He has been repeatedly honored for his work in longer journal essays. Roth received an honorary doctorate from the University of Ioannina, Greece. His most recent award is a best paper award at ICSE for a paper on studying software engineering beyond 2025.

Roth has researched knowing and learning across the lifespan, from early childhood to retired scientists. Though a lot of his research has been conducted in the context of science and mathematics at school, he has done many long-term ethnographic studies (alone or with students). He studied field ecologists (3 yrs), fish culturists (5 yrs), experimental biologists (5 yrs), environmental activists (8 yrs), electricians at school and work (4 yrs), and seafarers (3 yrs). His most recent ethnographic effort was devoted to aviation, where he conducted field research for 3 years.

Roth published across many scientific disciplines, including the natural sciences, psychology, sociology, education, and linguistics. He has (co-) written or (co-) edited 56 books, 205 book chapters, and 455 peer-reviewed journal articles. He has been editor of Mind, Culture and Activity (which became part of Tompson ISI under his reign) for 5 years, founded Cultural Studies of Science Education, which he co-edited for 5 years, and has been a co-editor of Forum Qualitative Social Research for 14 years. In addition, he has been associate editor and held other editor and editorial board functions for many journals.