What is the human factor term called for this bias?

Joined
Sep 10, 2005
Messages
2,545
Location
Erie, PA
In a lot of mentour pilot stories and other online air crash documentaries, what is the term used when a pilot knows (insert the problem here) is not the problem as the evidence in front of their eyes shows otherwise. Its talked alot about and it is a human factors issue. Im drawing a blank and wanted to read more into it.
 
Confirmation bias, is one that gets me once in a while, when diagnosing a car problem, or more like skipping a thorough diagnoses of a car problem... Like I don't need to investigate because I've seen this before... and then its some new failure that produced the same problems as a previous failure. Not a problem on the ground as much as in the air!
 
Confirmation bias is the correct term. You only see what fits your preconceived idea and ignore or discount other inputs.

One of my former neighbours was a pilot for a major airline. We were talking about an amateur pilot who had just followed a defective gyro right into the ground killing everyone on board.

He said that during one of their simulations the pilot flying was following the defective gyro in front of him around and around in circles, ignoring the other 2 gyros as well as the compass. My neighbour, as the co-pilot, was forced to intervene.

Up until that point the pilot flying just didn't catch on to what was happening. And that's why airliners have two competent pilots.
 
It appears to be a Swedish Aviation Website using the British spelling of Mentor.

I think it's a deliberate corruption of the word mentor purely for the commercial purposes of that website. There is no special British spelling, we use mentor like everybody else. Mentour is a name rather than a word, it doesn't exist in any major English dictionary.
 
Last edited:
I think it's a deliberate corruption of the word mentor purely for the commercial purposes of that website. There is no special British spelling, we use mentor like everybody else. Mentour is a name rather than a word, it doesn't exist in any major English dictionary.
Would I still get honorable mention if I said that mentor in Lithuanian is mentorius or méntoras in Greek? :)

Probably not.:cry:
 
Last edited:
Back
Top Bottom