Social and cultural issues during Shuttle/Mir space missions

• Published in: Acta astronautica Vol. 47; no. 2; pp. 647 - 655
• Main Authors: Kanas, Nick, Salnitskiy, Vyacheslav, Grund, Ellen M., Gushin, Vadim, Weiss, Daniel S., Kozerenko, Olga, Sled, Alexander, Marmar, Charles R.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Legacy CDMS Elsevier Ltd 01.07.2000
• Subjects: Adaptation, Psychological; Aerospace Medicine; Astronauts - psychology; Behavioral research; Behavioral Sciences; Cross-Cultural Comparison; Female; Group Processes; Humans; International Cooperation; Interpersonal Relations; Male; Psychological Tests; Russia; Social aspects; Social Isolation; Space Flight; Standardization; Stress, Psychological; Subjective testing; United States; Weightlessness; United States; Russia; United States; Astronauts/psychology; Non-Nasa Center; Male; Short Duration; Russia; Long Duration; Female; Social Isolation; Interpersonal Relations; Mir Project; Human; International Cooperation; Weightlessness; Space Flight; Flight Experiment; Sts Shuttle Project; Group Processes; Cross-Cultural Comparison; Stress, Psychological; Nasa Discipline Space Human Factors; Psychological Tests; Aerospace Medicine; Manned; Nasa Experiment Number 9401628; Adaptation, Psychological; NASA Discipline Space Human Factors; NASA Experiment Number 9401628; Non-NASA Center
• ISSN: 0094-5765; 1879-2030
• DOI: 10.1016/S0094-5765(00)00102-8

A number of interpersonal issues relevant to manned space missions have been identified from the literature. These include crew tension, cohesion, leadership, language and cultural factors, and displacement. Ground-based studies by others and us have clarified some of the parameters of these issues and have indicated ways in which they could be studied during actual space missions. In this paper, we summarize some of our findings related to social and cultural issues from a NASA-funded study conducted during several Shuttle/Mir space missions. We used standardized mood and group climate measures that were completed on a weekly basis by American and Russian crew and mission control subjects who participated in these missions. Our results indicated that American subjects reported more dissatisfaction with their interpersonal environment than their Russian counterparts, especially American astronauts. Mission control personnel were more dysphoric than crewmembers, but both groups were signficantly less dysphoric than other work groups on Earth. Countermeasures based on our findings are discussed which can be applied to future multicultural space missions.