Identification of degrees of importance of psychological and physiological factors of air traffic controllers in their successful professional activities

Introduction. The role of physiological and psychological factors in the professional activities of air traffic controllers. Professional activity of air traffic controllers refers to the category of emotionally rich and psychotraumatic stimuli [1, p. 71-72]. It is characterized by extreme dynamism and the inability to predict the full development of events. This causes a high frequency of appearance of neurotic states among air traffic controllers and their presence in a state of constant emotional tension [1, p. 163]. Effective adaptation of air traffic controllers to emotional tension is most evident in moderately expressed psychological, psychophysiological, physiological and biochemical indicators of vital activity, as well as in the rapid restoration of the initial functional state after the termination of the workload [1, p. 199].

The successful activity of air traffic controllers depends on the state of their somatic and neuropsychiatric health, age and individual-typological features of their personality, psychological climate in the team, psychological and physiological characteristics [1, p. 68].

It follows from the above that while teaching “Human factor in aviation”, “Aviation psychology” subjects in the training programs of air traffic controllers, and a great attention to the importance of physiological and psychological factors for the successful professional activity of air traffic controllers should be given in their training programs as well. Using the knowledge gained by studying the opinions of air traffic controllers in the materials of classes will be very useful. To determine the degree of importance of physiological and psychological factors for the success of air traffic controllers, a study was organized, which includes 2 stages: trial and main.

This paper presents the process and the results of the trial stage of studying the views of air traffic controllers who work at the airports of civil aviation in 2

Uzbekistan, the importance of psychological and physiological factors of air traffic controllers for their successful professional activities.

Drawing up lists of the most important physiological and psychological factors of air traffic controllers necessary for their professional success . To study the opinions of air traffic controllers on the importance of psychological and physiological factors for their successful professional activity, a literature review in Russian and English was conducted and lists of the most important physiological and psychological factors of air traffic controllers necessary for their professional success were compiled. The following factors were included in the list of physiological factors: hearing (sound perception), vision (color perception), vision (visual acuity), pronunciation, staying power, breathing, metabolism, weight and height relation, sufficient sleep time, skin sensitivity. And the list of psychological factors included such psychological factors as intellectual ability, self-assessment, neuropsychological resistance, a sense of responsibility for one’s actions, nonstandard thinking, mood, temperament, satisfaction with work, self-confidence, ambitiousness.

Process of determining the degree of importance of physiological and psychological factors air traffic controllers for their successful professional activities. A questionnaire was developed to examine the views of air traffic controllers on the importance of psychological and physiological factors for their successful professional activities. The questionnaire provided the above lists of psychological and physiological factors in the tables. The respondents were required to respond in a writing form, using questionnaires to provide qualitative and quantitative assessments of the importance of each factor, as shown in the tables. The scale of quantitative assessments varied from 0 to 10, and the following degrees were proposed for qualitative assessments: the most important, important, moderate important, not important.

In this survey, 12 air traffic controllers with work experience from 3 to 39 years participated as respondents: three of them had 3 years of work experience, and the remaining 9 had 4,5,6,7,9,12,25,34,39 years of work experience as an air traffic controller, respectively.

The results of the air traffic controllers ' opinions and their analysis.

Analysis of the results of quantitative assessments. The results of the study of

Factors and their assessment Importance degree Physiological factors The mean arithmetic value of quantitative grades of the scale of importance of each factor 1 Hearing - perception of sounds 9,57 2 Sufficient sleep time 9,12 3 Sight - visual acuity 8,54 4 Pronunciation 8,47 5 Sight - the perception of color 7,25 6 Staying power 6,87 7 Breathing 4 8 Metabolism 3,16 9 Weight and height relation 2,79 10 Skin Sensitivity 1,58 air traffic controllers ' opinions on the importance of physiological and psychological factors in the form of their degrees of importance and calculated arithmetic mean values of quantitative assessments of the importance of each factor of these two groups of factors are given in Tables 1 and 2.

As follows from the processing of the survey results, according to air traffic controllers, the most important of the 10 physiological factors considered are hearing (sound perception), sufficient sleep time, visual acuity, pronunciation, color perception, staying power, and skin sensitivity is almost not important. Air traffic controllers-respondents consider important almost all considered psychological factors, but they consider more important the 4

following factors of the 10 considered psychological factors: a sense of responsibility for one’s actions, neuropsychological stability, mood, satisfaction with work, self-assessment, intellectual ability, self-confidence and non-standard thinking.

Table 2. The degree of importance of psychological factors and the arithmetic mean value of their importance

Factors and their assessment Importance degree	Psychological factors	The mean arithmetic value of quantitative grades of the scale of importance of each factor
1	A sense of responsibility for one's actions	9,33
2	Neuropsychological resistance	8,74
3	Mood	8,21
4	Satisfaction with work	8
5	Self-assessment	7,5
6	Intellectual abilities	7,5
7	Self-confidence	7,4
8	Non-standard thinking	6,92
9	Temperament	5,99
10	Ambitiousness	5,16

Analysis of the results of qualitative assessments. The results of processing qualitative assessments of air traffic controllers of the importance of physiological and psychological factors are shown in Table 3. As follows from table 3, the more important physiological factors of the 10 factors considered are: hearing (sound perception), sufficient sleep time, pronunciation, vision (color perception), staying power, vision (visual acuity). Respondents indicated the importance of all 10 psychological factors. But, according to air traffic controllers, the more important of them are: a sense of responsibility for one’s actions, neuropsychological stability, mood, intellectual abilities, job satisfaction, self-esteem, non-standard thinking, self-confidence. As follows from the comparative analysis of the degrees of importance of individual physiological and psychological factors that are obtained by processing quantitative (table 1 and 2) and qualitative (table 3) assessments of air traffic controllers, there are some differences between the obtained results. In the sequence of the importance of physiological factors, which were obtained by two methods of evaluation, 1-, 2 - and 10-places remained for the same factors. But the factors holding 3 - to 9 - importance, different. In the sequence of the importance of psychological factors retained the same degree 1-, 2-, 3-, 9-, 10-factors. And the factors, which occupies a 4 - to 8 - degree of importance differ. But despite these differences, in the results obtained by both methods, the more important 6 physiological and 8 psychological factors are the same.

Table 3. Physiological and psychological factors and their degree of importance

Factors Importance degree	Physiological factors	Psychological factors
1	Hearing - perception of sounds	A sense of responsibility for one's actions
2	Sufficient sleep time	Neuropsychological stability
3	Pronunciation	Mood
4	Sight - the perception of light	Intellectual abilities
5	Staying power	Satisfaction with work
6	Sight - visual acuity	Self-assessment
7	Metabolism	Non-standard thinking
8	Weight and height relation	Self-confidence
9	Breathing	Temperament
10	Skin Sensitivity	Ambitiousness

The difficulties and omissions arisen during the course of the study.

• 1.    To place the qualitative assessments of the level of importance of the factors by the respondents the following extent was given in the questionnaire: the most important, important, moderate important, not important. Despite this, air traffic controllers-respondents used the following 10 degrees or levels of importance: too important, most important, not too important, very important, not very important, important, medium important, less important, least important, not important. This created difficulties in determining the degrees of importance of both groups of factors.

• 2.    Such factors as metabolism, intellectual abilities, non-standard thinking, temperament, ambition require additional clarification of their meanings. The lack of formulated definitions of these factors makes it necessary for respondents to consider them in dictionaries, which complicates the process of conducting the survey.

Objectives of further development of the study. For further development of the text of the questionnaire to continue this study in the main part of the study, it is necessary to perform the following works:

• 1.    It is necessary to increase the number of physiological and psychological factors in the preparation of their list, conducting an additional review and analysis of literature, textbooks and materials that are used in the Universities of developed, developing countries and the CIS countries.

• 2.    In the main part of the study, it is necessary to study the opinions of more air traffic controllers than was done in its trial part. The increase of the respondents number will increase the reliability of the research results. In addition, it will provide an opportunity to analyze the results of the survey, taking into account the demographic and other characteristics of the respondents.

• 3.    When developing a questionnaire for the main part of the study, the following degrees should be proposed as degrees or levels of importance for

• 4.    The developed text of the questionnaire should contain definitions of all factors attached to the text, having formulated them by a comparative study of the 3-4 most widely used definitions in the literature and materials of air traffic controllers training programs.

qualitative assessments: over-important, very important, important, less important, not important. This will avoid the complexity of processing the estimates of the respondents.

Conclusion . This article presents and discusses the results of the trial phase of the study to determine the degree of importance of physiological and psychological factors for the successful professional activity of air traffic controllers. The results presented in this paper will be used to improve the implementation of the main part of the study, to enrich the materials of the subjects “Human factor in aviation”, “Aviation psychology” in the training programs of air traffic controllers, as well as the relevant sections in the training programs. In addition, at this time they are used by teachers of the Department “Air navigation systems” for the formation and development of knowledge, skills and experience in research work of students and young teachers.

Gratitude . The authors of this work thank all the air traffic controllers -respondents who work at the airports of civil aviation of Uzbekistan, for their assistance and cooperation in completing the questionnaire of this study.