Analysis of Aviation Miscommunications based on Grice’s Conversational Maxims: The Case of Iranian Aviators

Miscommunication has been reported as a major contributing factor to aviation mishaps. About 70% of the first 28000 reports to NASA Aviation Safety Reporting System were related to communication problems (Sexton, 1999). According to Chaparro and Groff (2002), the most frequent human errors in aircraft maintenance, is supposed to be information misinterpretation. The movement area of an airport is typically the place where a single misunderstanding may have serious and adverse effect on flight safety. Furthermore, Eadie (2000) puts emphasis on conducting research on applied communication related to real phenomena in the real world. Therefore, the current study aims to investigate miscommunication among aviation personnel. To this end, first, a corpus of 31 authentic audio records and reports of aviation mishaps was analyzed based on Grice’s maxims. Consequently, the findings of the study revealed that teaching Grice’s (1975) Maxims needs to be taken into account in verbal communication. The findings of the research have implications for curriculum designers, pilots, and air traffic controllers.