Correlation of perceived social support with fatigue and anxiety in army aviation pilots

Abstract

Objective To explore the correlation of perceived social support with fatigue and anxiety in army aviation pilots in order to found a basis for precision intervention. Methods From July 10 to 13, 2022, random sampling was conducted to subject from an army air brigade. The participants (n=88) were surveyed with Perceived Social Support, Multidimensional Fatigue, and Anxiety Scale. Then discussions and individual communication were used to collect supplementary data. SPSS 20.0 statistics was employed for descriptive analysis in measure data and frequency analysis in enumerate data. The correlation of perceived social support with fatigue and anxiety was analyzed with Pearson analysis. Results For the 85 issued questionnaires (including all above scales), all of them were retrieved validly, with a rate of 100%. Among the 85 participants, they were 83 males (97.65%) and 2 females (2.35%), and 80 pilots (94.11%), 2 navigators (2.35%) and 3 aerial mechanics (3.53%). There were 82(96.47%) of them in an age range of 20~39 years. Moreover, the proportion of individuals with high perceived social support was 68.23% (58/85), that of low and moderate anxiety was 100% (85/85), and that of non-significant fatigue status (scored 55.71±8.48) was 98.82% (84/85), respectively. Perceived social support (scored 62.22±14.67) was negatively correlated with anxiety (scored 14.44±3.86, P 0.05). Conclusion For the army aviators, their perceived social support may cause anxiety, and then in turn affect their operational performance and health levels. Precise intervention should be implemented to learn from social support for this population in order to improve medical support for them.

Keywords

• army aviators
• flight personnel
• perceived social support
• fatigue
• anxiety