You would think that with the fact that autos have had pushbutton belt latches for better than 20 years and that the population (that uses seatbelts) has the muscle memory for those kinds of latches that the aircraft certification agencies would change the belt latches on planes.

The mechanism being different from what everyone knows is kind of like having to turn the handle on the emergency exit clockwise to make it unlatch- very unnatural when reflex action is better.

The current airplane seatbelt latches are just like the ones my father installed in our cars in the 1960's - when cars didn't come with seatbelts.