ABSTRACT
Unlike many other aspects of psychology that attempt to isolate underlying universal principles of human behaviour which are invariant across people, the science of Individual Differences focuses on describing the manners in which people differ and the implications that these differences have for behaviour. Some individual differences are readily apparent such as age, sex and ethnicity; other aspects of individual differences require assessment using a quantifiable measure (e.g. social economic status) however many aspects of individual differences require measurement and inference about latent traits. Examples of the latter include personality, intelligence and other cognitive abilities. It is a fact that people differ in these traits, and the fact that some traits are desirable for the job of a pilot and some are not, underpins many aspects of the selection process (see Chapter 8 on Pilot Selection in Part Two of this book). This chapter is by no means a comprehensive view of the science of Individual Differences. It merely attempts to provide the reader with a flavour of a few key aspects of the underpinning science.
