Learning from Errors: Cognition, Emotions and Safety Culture in the Italian Air Force

Learning from errors is essential to ensuring organizational safety and improving levels of performance. We consider the interaction between cognition, emotions, and safety culture in the context of a field study on learning from errors in the Italian Air Force. We find that errors often stem from sequential action chains that are concealed in habitual behavior and that become visible only when unforeseen circumstances occur. Furthermore, cognitive appraisal of risky situations triggers emotions of variable intensity that, when rationalized retrospectively, promote the internalization of lessons learned. Finally, cognitive and emotional experiences of errors are grounded in the broader safety culture of an organization, which provides a supportive context for error reporting and encourages the sharing of information and knowledge about error experiences. The analysis further suggests that cognition, emotion, and safety culture interact through sensemaking processes that inform the construction of errors and affect learning outcomes.