Module 9.3–9.4 — Social psychology and factors that affect performance

Scope and levels

9.3 Social psychology (level 1): responsibility, motivation, peer pressure, culture, teamwork, management and leadership. 9.4 Factors that affect performance (level 2): fitness/health, stress, time pressure, workload, sleep/fatigue/shift work, alcohol/medication/drugs, lack of manpower.

9.3 Social psychology

Accountability and responsibility

• Individual responsibility: every engineer is responsible for the work they perform and sign for. A certifying engineer remains accountable for the certificate of release to service they sign, even if others did the work.
• Group responsibility can dilute individual responsibility — "someone else will check it" (diffusion of responsibility / social loafing). Clear task allocation and individual sign-off counter it.
• Groupthink: a cohesive group seeks agreement and suppresses dissent, leading to poor decisions.
• Risky shift: groups can make riskier decisions than individuals would.

Motivation and demotivation

• Motivation is what drives a person towards a goal. Maslow's hierarchy of needs (from base): physiological → safety → social (belonging) → esteem → self-actualisation. Lower needs must largely be met before higher ones motivate.
• Herzberg: "hygiene factors" (pay, conditions, policies) cause dissatisfaction if poor but don't motivate; "motivators" (achievement, recognition, responsibility) drive satisfaction.
• Highly motivated staff can also cause risk — e.g. an eager engineer short-cutting procedures to get the aircraft out on time.
• Demotivation signs: absenteeism, poor quality work, lack of interest; causes include job insecurity, lack of recognition, poor management.

Peer pressure

Actual or perceived pressure to conform to the behaviour of the group, e.g. not using the manual because "nobody else does", or not asking for help. It links directly to norms in the Dirty Dozen. Counter: a positive safety culture, assertiveness and leaders who set the example.

Culture

• Organisational culture — "the way we do things round here"; shaped by management behaviour. A good safety culture is informed, reporting, just, flexible and learning (Reason).
• National culture differences (attitude to authority, communication style, language) affect teamwork in multinational organisations and contract maintenance.

Teamwork

Benefits: shared workload, cross-checking, pooled skills. Risks: assuming others have checked, poor communication between teams/shifts. Good teams have a clear common goal, defined roles, open communication, mutual trust and good leadership. Maintenance Resource Management (MRM) training develops these skills.

Management, supervision and leadership

Role	Focus
Manager	Plans, organises, allocates resources, sets policies
Supervisor	Oversees day-to-day work, ensures standards and procedures are followed; may also be a certifying engineer
Leader	Influences and motivates people, sets example and culture; can exist at any level

Supervisors in a hands-on role can become too involved in the task and lose the overall picture; good supervisors ensure safety is not traded for schedule.

9.4 Factors that affect performance

Fitness and health

• Staff must be fit for duty — illness (colds, flu), injuries, and medication can reduce attention and judgement.
• Engineers are responsible for declaring when they are unfit. Part-66 (66.B.500) allows the authority to suspend or revoke a licence for maintenance or certifying while adversely affected by alcohol or drugs.

Stress

• Stress is the body's response to demands (stressors). Acute stress is short-term; chronic stress is long-term.
• Sources: domestic (bereavement, divorce, moving house, finances) and work-related (time pressure, workload, conflict, job insecurity, poor working conditions).
• Moderate arousal improves performance; excessive arousal degrades it — the Yerkes-Dodson inverted-U curve.
• Symptoms: physical (headache, raised heart rate), behavioural (irritability, mistakes, increased alcohol use), cognitive (poor concentration, narrowed attention).
• Coping: identify the stressor, rest, exercise, talk to someone, use procedures; organisations can provide support and manage workload.

Time pressure and deadlines

Real or perceived pressure to release the aircraft. It leads to short-cuts, skipped checks and inadequate handovers. Counter: plan realistically, communicate status early, never sign for what is not done — the "no" option must be supported by management.

Workload

• Overload: more tasks than capacity → errors, missed items, narrowed attention.
• Underload: boredom, reduced vigilance, complacency (e.g. long repetitive inspections, night shift with little work).
• Workload management: plan tasks, prioritise, delegate, use checklists, ask for help, schedule critical tasks away from the low point of alertness.

Sleep, fatigue and shift work

• Adults typically need about 7–8 hours of sleep. Sleep follows cycles of about 90 minutes with non-REM (light to deep) and REM stages.
• Circadian rhythm: the ~24-hour body clock controlling body temperature and alertness. Alertness is lowest around 03:00–06:00 (and a smaller dip early afternoon).
• Fatigue — physical or mental tiredness from lack of sleep, long duty, workload. Effects resemble alcohol: about 17–19 hours awake gives performance impairment comparable to a blood alcohol concentration of about 0.05 %.
• Symptoms: slow reactions, lapses of attention, poor memory, irritability, "micro-sleeps".
• Shift work disrupts the circadian rhythm; forward-rotating shifts (morning → afternoon → night) are easier to adapt to than backward rotation.
• Part-145 145.A.47 requires production planning to take human performance limitations into account; AMC refers to limits on working hours, rest periods and fatigue management (145.A.30 also requires a plan for adequate staffing).

Key fact: The lowest point of human alertness is in the early morning (about 03:00–06:00), when body temperature is lowest — many maintenance errors occur on night shift.

Alcohol, medication and drug abuse

• Alcohol is a depressant; it impairs judgement, coordination and vision. The body eliminates roughly one unit per hour; there is no way to speed this up (coffee, cold showers do not work).
• Effects can persist for a long time after drinking (hangover reduces performance even at zero blood alcohol).
• Medication: antihistamines (drowsiness), sleeping pills (hangover effect), painkillers with codeine, decongestants — check with a doctor/pharmacist before working.
• Illegal drugs: impair perception and judgement; may also be detected long after use.
• Working or certifying while adversely affected by alcohol or drugs is grounds for licence suspension/revocation (66.B.500(7)).

Lack of manpower

Too few people for the work leads to excessive hours, time pressure, missed rest and dropped tasks. Organisations must have a man-hour plan (145.A.30(d)) showing sufficient staff to plan, perform, supervise, inspect and monitor the work, and must take action if actual man-hours fall significantly short.