Study on the influencing factors of the flight crew’s TSA based on DEMATEL–ISM method

It is increasingly being recognized that the flight crew’s team situation awareness (TSA) is essential for flight safety. To explore the inherent correlation and hierarchical structure of the flight crew’s TSA, 21 influencing factors were extracted from individuals, flight crew, equipment, environment, management, and task perspectives based on the Delphi Method and flight accident investigation. By absorbing the advantages of Decision Making Trial and Evaluation (DEMATEL) and Interpretive Structure Modeling (ISM), the influencing degree, the influenced degree, the centrality, and the causality of each influencing factor were calculated to find out the key factors and the cause-and-effect relationship; a multi-level hierarchical model was established for analyzing the interaction mechanism of the flight crew’s TSA. The results show: (i) for the formation and maintenance of the flight crew’s TSA, among the 21 influencing factors, task property, safety consciousness, workload, communication, coordination, physiological, and mental state are the most important influencing factors; (ii) the multi-level hierarchical model is divided into five layers and reflects the function pathway. Attention, memory, and safety consciousness are the direct causes of the failure of the flight crew’s TSA. Regulatory policy, safety culture, and training can be considered upon as the deepest and fundamental influencing factors affecting the flight crew’s TSA; (iii) the mutual influencing degree of elements and the cause-and-effect relationship are quantificationally presented to better reveal the inherent correlation. This study provides a workable reference for analyzing the flight crew’s TSA and offers a novel decision-making approach to support better flight safety management by priority actions.