Extended psychophysiological assessment during a simulated spacecraft docking experiment

Abstract

INTRODUCTION: In former joint space studies of the IBMP, RSC Energia and the Institute of Aerospace medicine (DLR) on MIR and ISS cardiovascular measures were registered to assess the physiological cost of cosmonauts during their docking training. In parallel the fundamental frequency of voice was analyzed to obtain information about the unconscious subjective evaluation of the subject’s perception of situation control. The results of the studies onboard MIR and ISS provided evidence that the docking training did not increase “voice-stress” indicators or indicators of enhancement of the cardiovascular arousal. As far the performance of the cosmonauts was rather good this could be seen as an valid indication of cosmonaut’s proficiency and their expectable reliability in running a docking maneuver. As a next step a very classic but robust Event Related Potential (ERP) design was implemented. We tested the possibility to use the component P300 to assess and monitor the individual cognitive difficulty of operators in a certain docking task. The space study is still in preparation; a ground based study was run. It was expected that during difficult tasks the secondary task is performed worse and the P300 has smaller amplitude and longer latency. METHODS: The study was run within the complex “:envihab” of the DLR. The participants were volunteers. The test session consisted of 6 standard tasks (condition “easy”) and one really difficult task (condition “difficult”). A training model of the flight hardware in the Russian segment of the ISS was used. An EEG-electrode system with active dry electrodes was applied. RESULTS: The magnitude of the P300 was smaller and its latency was larger for the difficult task than for the easier task. We consider it important, that is was possible that for the P300 differences statistical significances could be assessed within single subjects using all evoked EEG-episodes for each channel. CONCLUSIONS: In a ground-bases study we demonstrated the possibility to assess the cognitive difficulty by means of the ERP component P300. This additional psychophysiological assessment could improve the performance and behavioral assessment during the docking training and thus enhancing mission safety.