Effect of Sleep Deprivation on the Performance of Pilots: A Systematic Review

Abstract

Sleep deprivation negatively affects a person's emotions, cognition, and performance and ultimately reduces safety. The main purpose of this systematic review is to study and report the evidence on the effect of sleep deprivation on the performance of pilots. This systematic review was performed according to the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses. International databases including PubMed, Web of Science (WOS) and Scopus were considered for the search of English articles up to April of 2023. Keywords were sleep deprivation, pilot, flight, performance, airline, air force, flight safety, fatigue, pilot performance, flight performance, eye movement, workload, motion, visual, attention, errors, cognition, sleep quality, and circadian rhythm. In this systematic review, 12 studies consisting of 259 subjects remained. Most of the studies have reported the negative effects of sleep deprivation in a different way, and the decrease in performance was expressed as one of the important issues following sleep deprivation. As various studies show, any type of sleep deprivation in pilots can have negative effects on their performance, and this decrease in performance can have irreparable consequences.

Keywords

• Sleep
• Deprivation
• Pilot
• Performance