Location

Hotel Neptun - Dubrovnik, Coatia

Presentation Type

Presentation

Start Date

25-4-2017 1:45 PM

End Date

25-4-2017 2:00 PM

Description

More than a decade after the ICAO LPRs were announced, most international pilots and controllers have been through aviation English training and testing cycles, but can we state that aviation communications have really improved because of that?

This workshop was presented twice in a row in the session "Have air-ground communications improved?" and aimed at addressing some in-depth topics such as: is communication more effective nowadays?; have the LPRs increased native speakers’ awareness of the needs of non-native English pilots & ATCOs?; is phraseology being overshadowed by plain English? and how effective is communication among personnel with varying proficiency levels?

In order to shed new light onto these questions and to raise awareness on how to analyze fluency and interaction in a radiotelephony corpus, on top of relating the findings to the Proficiency Scale provided by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), the workshop presented five authentic samples of air-ground communications that have happened recently, each of them presenting a different non-routine or emergency situation.

To support the analysis, some resources from corpus linguistics were provided. The proponents started the workshop by presenting data from aviation English corpora with over 100 communications from pilots and controllers from all over the world, to bring some insights about elements collected from an automated analysis of inputted language. For instance, a word cloud and a table were presented with the 36 most frequent three-word clusters, which revealed the frequent use of modalized language, in expressions such as if you can, if you need, 'd like to, able to do, and do you want. The use of gonna was very frequent, too, in chunks such as I'm gonna, you're gonna, we're gonna, which reveals the immediate character of the decisions that are made in real time. But there is some room for politeness too, which can be attested in expressions like thank you, thank you very much, okay, that's fine and the use of honorifics.

After these general comments about characteristics of aviation English, participants were invited to work together in the analysis of 5 transcripts of samples of communications taken from the abovementioned corpus. They were split in groups of 4-5, with different backgrounds (pilots, controllers, trainers, raters, civil aviation authorities, etc.) and had to analyze the linguistic strategies used by pilots and controllers in their effort to communicate effectively in non-routine or emergency situations. To guide the analysis, participants were encouraged to look at the use of modalizers to soften language; any switches from phraseology to plain English; assumptions of peer proficiency; and assumptions of shared knowledge. It is important to emphasize that, so as to prevent their identification and avoid any nationality or accent influence in the judgment, the call signs and ATC facilities were replaced by fictional names based on birds (seagull, lark, dove, etc.). To represent the features of spoken language, symbols were used in the scripts (/ for prosodic breaks, … for removed parts, <> for tagged information, uh for hesitations).

There was a time limit of 10 minutes for the discussion of each transcript. The workshop presenters monitored the groups to guide the discussions and control time and pace. After the time was over, groups had to share their answers with the audience and, for each of the five transcripts, the comments were presented on a slide. Afterwards, the audio of each transcript was played, so that the audience could listen to the actual events and be exposed to features such as prosody and accents – which were facilitated by the identification of the airlines, facilities and presumed nationalities. Then, they were asked whether would change any of their answers or ideas after listening to the audios.

After the four scripts were discussed, a 5th transcript was presented, this time with new information: when the audio was played, the audience realized that pilot and controller were non-native English speakers from the same nationality; but, even though they were experiencing stressful moments, they opted for speaking English instead of switching to their shared language. There was consensus about the proficiency of these professionals, who were able to manage the communication and use linguistic strategies effectively in a clear, concise and precise way. The aim of this discussion was to raise issues questioning the relevance of classifying pilots and ATCOs as native or non-native speakers or aiming at "near-native proficiency", and promote a new view – that of proficient (or non-proficient) aviation professionals should be attested in a situation of peer communication – and what should be considered good examples (models) of fluency and interaction on the radiotelephony.

To end the workshop, another word cloud was presented, this time showing the most frequent words taken from the five scripts altogether. Some graphs were designed based the most frequent expressions along with some communicative functions such as: sharing information on future actions; sharing information on capacity; making requests and offers and exchanging information, based on Mell’s aviation language competences (2004) which are mentioned in Doc 9835 (ICAO, 2010). But, due to time constraints, they were not demonstrated to the audience of either workshop.

By exploring real life communications beyond the triad pronunciation-structure-vocabulary (usually the linguistic criteria most dealt with), the main objective of the workshop was to lead participants to a discussion and personal reflection about whether the LPRs could contemplate these fluency and interaction elements and how to improve them with more specific guidelines concerning training and testing. The overall impression was that there is much emphasis on individual performance, when there is a need for a more integrated approach, including pragmatic elements which will enhance a more complete language competence. Stakeholders must take into account not only the speaker´s communication skills, but also the importance of the interlocutors' role in linguistic and non-linguistic aspects, particularly for this voice-only communication context.

Download

Share

COinS
 
Apr 25th, 1:45 PM Apr 25th, 2:00 PM

Are the LPRs focusing on real life communication issues?

Hotel Neptun - Dubrovnik, Coatia

More than a decade after the ICAO LPRs were announced, most international pilots and controllers have been through aviation English training and testing cycles, but can we state that aviation communications have really improved because of that?

This workshop was presented twice in a row in the session "Have air-ground communications improved?" and aimed at addressing some in-depth topics such as: is communication more effective nowadays?; have the LPRs increased native speakers’ awareness of the needs of non-native English pilots & ATCOs?; is phraseology being overshadowed by plain English? and how effective is communication among personnel with varying proficiency levels?

In order to shed new light onto these questions and to raise awareness on how to analyze fluency and interaction in a radiotelephony corpus, on top of relating the findings to the Proficiency Scale provided by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), the workshop presented five authentic samples of air-ground communications that have happened recently, each of them presenting a different non-routine or emergency situation.

To support the analysis, some resources from corpus linguistics were provided. The proponents started the workshop by presenting data from aviation English corpora with over 100 communications from pilots and controllers from all over the world, to bring some insights about elements collected from an automated analysis of inputted language. For instance, a word cloud and a table were presented with the 36 most frequent three-word clusters, which revealed the frequent use of modalized language, in expressions such as if you can, if you need, 'd like to, able to do, and do you want. The use of gonna was very frequent, too, in chunks such as I'm gonna, you're gonna, we're gonna, which reveals the immediate character of the decisions that are made in real time. But there is some room for politeness too, which can be attested in expressions like thank you, thank you very much, okay, that's fine and the use of honorifics.

After these general comments about characteristics of aviation English, participants were invited to work together in the analysis of 5 transcripts of samples of communications taken from the abovementioned corpus. They were split in groups of 4-5, with different backgrounds (pilots, controllers, trainers, raters, civil aviation authorities, etc.) and had to analyze the linguistic strategies used by pilots and controllers in their effort to communicate effectively in non-routine or emergency situations. To guide the analysis, participants were encouraged to look at the use of modalizers to soften language; any switches from phraseology to plain English; assumptions of peer proficiency; and assumptions of shared knowledge. It is important to emphasize that, so as to prevent their identification and avoid any nationality or accent influence in the judgment, the call signs and ATC facilities were replaced by fictional names based on birds (seagull, lark, dove, etc.). To represent the features of spoken language, symbols were used in the scripts (/ for prosodic breaks, … for removed parts, <> for tagged information, uh for hesitations).

There was a time limit of 10 minutes for the discussion of each transcript. The workshop presenters monitored the groups to guide the discussions and control time and pace. After the time was over, groups had to share their answers with the audience and, for each of the five transcripts, the comments were presented on a slide. Afterwards, the audio of each transcript was played, so that the audience could listen to the actual events and be exposed to features such as prosody and accents – which were facilitated by the identification of the airlines, facilities and presumed nationalities. Then, they were asked whether would change any of their answers or ideas after listening to the audios.

After the four scripts were discussed, a 5th transcript was presented, this time with new information: when the audio was played, the audience realized that pilot and controller were non-native English speakers from the same nationality; but, even though they were experiencing stressful moments, they opted for speaking English instead of switching to their shared language. There was consensus about the proficiency of these professionals, who were able to manage the communication and use linguistic strategies effectively in a clear, concise and precise way. The aim of this discussion was to raise issues questioning the relevance of classifying pilots and ATCOs as native or non-native speakers or aiming at "near-native proficiency", and promote a new view – that of proficient (or non-proficient) aviation professionals should be attested in a situation of peer communication – and what should be considered good examples (models) of fluency and interaction on the radiotelephony.

To end the workshop, another word cloud was presented, this time showing the most frequent words taken from the five scripts altogether. Some graphs were designed based the most frequent expressions along with some communicative functions such as: sharing information on future actions; sharing information on capacity; making requests and offers and exchanging information, based on Mell’s aviation language competences (2004) which are mentioned in Doc 9835 (ICAO, 2010). But, due to time constraints, they were not demonstrated to the audience of either workshop.

By exploring real life communications beyond the triad pronunciation-structure-vocabulary (usually the linguistic criteria most dealt with), the main objective of the workshop was to lead participants to a discussion and personal reflection about whether the LPRs could contemplate these fluency and interaction elements and how to improve them with more specific guidelines concerning training and testing. The overall impression was that there is much emphasis on individual performance, when there is a need for a more integrated approach, including pragmatic elements which will enhance a more complete language competence. Stakeholders must take into account not only the speaker´s communication skills, but also the importance of the interlocutors' role in linguistic and non-linguistic aspects, particularly for this voice-only communication context.

 

To view the content in your browser, please download Adobe Reader or, alternately,
you may Download the file to your hard drive.

NOTE: The latest versions of Adobe Reader do not support viewing PDF files within Firefox on Mac OS and if you are using a modern (Intel) Mac, there is no official plugin for viewing PDF files within the browser window.