Developing a business case for aviation human factors training: Show me the benefit!

This paper reviews the available evidence for the benefits of aviation human factors training. Despite the proliferation of human factors training programs across the aviation industry since the 1980’s there are few published studies that demonstrate positive shifts in attitude or behavior following the introduction of such training. Those studies reporting benefits suffer from a number of methodological weaknesses including the failure to use control groups, lack of longitudinal evaluation and small sample sizes. Of significant concern is a lack of cost effectiveness data demonstrating a return on investment from human factors training. Recommendations for future research are made in the light of consolidating existing evidence on the commercial benefits of human factors training