Lack of Diversity on the Flight Deck
1. Qualitative results mainly focus on pilots’ responses. Only 2 HR replies have been quoted – the rest of the quotes come from pilots.
2. Quotes are rather scarce, so qualitative results are descriptive and show no proper evidence. For example, “The views by Pilot 1, Pilot 2, and Pilot 4 are consistent to the responses provided by HR 1 and HR 2” – however, we have seen only the response of Pilot 2, and it was not even related to the question discussed in the sentence above.
3. There are many inconsistencies, for example, “Compared to Pilot 6 who indicated that he used over $100,000 in acquiring his basic commercial pilot’s licence, Pilot 7 noted” – although “Pseudonyms, including Pilot 1, Pilot 2, Pilot 3, Pilot 4, Pilot 5, Pilot 6, HR 1, HR 2, HR 3, and HR 4 are used in referring to the ten respondents” – there is no Pilot 7.
4. Questions from questionnaire are politically incorrect and strange, for example.
i. How can you describe the employment of aviators of Asian/African American race in your company?
ii. How does your company handle Asian/African American pilots compared to white pilots?
vii. How comfortable are Asian/African American and White aviators in your company?
ix. Do you think the salary of Asian/ African American pilot is equal to that of white pilot?
x. Is the rating of pilot expertise different between white pilots and Asian/African American pilots?
Thus, quantitative results are dubious.
Moreover, many questions offer a place to explain the opinion (“c. If yes, please explain……), which is completely irrelevant, because questionnaires are used to gather quantitative data, not qualitative.
5. Many interview questions are not reflected in qualitative results, namely
i. What influences Asian/African Americans’ decision to pursue aviation career in the US?
vi. What is your understanding of the promotion process for Asian/African American aviator compared to white aviator?
Given all the issues, Discussion and Conclusion are also incorrect.
6. Add keywords to the abstract.
