Pilots in the Aircrew Stress Study

Last week I gave some general information about who participated in the Aircrew Stress Study survey, 411 of whom were pilots. Here are a few more demographic details about the pilots who filled in the survey questionnaire.

Most of the pilots -- about 60% -- were in their thirties and forties. The average age was 41 years. The youngest pilot was 21 years old, and the oldest was 67. Nearly 20% were over fifty.

The majority of the pilots who took the survey were college graduates -- about 59%. Only 11% had no post-secondary education.

Only 16% of the pilots said that they lived alone -- no family members or roommates. Most of the pilots -- about 77% -- said that they were either married or in a long-term committed relationship. More than a third had children under the age of 18 living in their households.

As I mentioned in the previous post about flight attendant demographics, survey participants were not asked the name of their employer, but they were asked to indicate the type of carrier that they worked for. While the majority of the flight attendants in the sample worked for U.S.-based scheduled carriers, this was true for only 28% of the pilots, and those were about evenly split between mainline and regional airlines. Another 20% worked for scheduled carriers outside the U.S. Corporate pilots made up 29% of the sample (a much larger number than expected, by the way). The rest flew passenger charters or freight.

Most of the pilots -- 56% -- said that they were captains. Another 38% said that they were first officers. The remainder either were flight engineers, or described themselves as second officers or "F/O #2 - augmented crew."

So, now you know some background details about who took part in the Aircrew Stress Study survey. Next I'll begin to talk about some of the actual findings.

** Copyright © 2007 by Bobbie Sullivan. All rights reserved. **