Discriminant analysis of purchasers of general aviation aircraft avionics

Abstract

Using data from the Federal Aviation Administration's national sample of general aviation (GA) aircraft owners (1975), this study explores the factors that influence aircraft owners' equipment purchase decisions for eight different types of communication and navigation instrumentation. The discriminant function is developed for noncompany owners of GA aircraft and is applied to data for company owners to generate the classification results. The results for almost all types of avionics suggest that the discriminant function—based on owner's type of use of aircraft, the aircraft's age, type of aircraft, and intensity of use—effectively discriminates between the equipped and nonequipped groups. The classification results, tested against both a proportional chance and pure chance criteria, are for the most part statistically significant at the 0.01 level. Thus the discriminant functions effectively identifies individuals most apt to purchase a particular type of avionics. Hence, it could be used by the avionics manufacturing industry to establish market profiles and by the FAA in estimating the expected demand on their ground facility services and equipment.