Urinalysis drug testing within a civilian pilot training program: did attitudes change during the 1990's?

BACKGROUND

Attitudes toward fairness and effectiveness of mandatory drug testing vary within pilot populations (4,8) as well as other populations (3). This descriptive-correlational study examined civilian student pilots' attitudes toward urinalysis (UA) drug testing over a 10-yr period and the pilots' opinions regarding effectiveness, adequacy, and fairness of the testing as a deterrent for substance abuse among pilots.

METHODS

A sample of three different groups of civilian aviation students (n = 314), consisted of 103 pilots studied prior to implementing a mandatory drug testing program, 113 pilots studied 1 yr after implementing a mandatory drug testing program, and 98 pilots studied 6 yr into a mandatory drug testing program. A 14-item questionnaire (alpha = 0.74), indicating degrees of agreement, was completed by the student pilots who were enrolled in a large civilian pilot training program.

RESULTS

There were no significant differences among the study pilots' feelings related to anxiety of drug testing when comparing non-mandatory and mandatory groups over time. The pilots continue to believe that alcohol use by pilots within this civilian piloting training program has decreased since testing was mandated and that drug use also showed a significant decrease (p = 0.01), although not as significant (p = 0.0001) as the decrease in alcohol use.

CONCLUSION

The study showed that alcohol and drug testing is more generally accepted by the pilots in the study as the decade of the 1990s came to a close.