Psychological Countermeasures for Extended Manned Spaceflights

Abstract

During extended manned space missions astronauts are exposed to many different psychological stressors like, e.g., confimement, isolation from family and friends, lack of privacy, sensory deprivation, dependance on life support systems. All of these stressors may impair the mental and emotional state of astronauts and may lead to inter- personal problems within space crews. Based on a review of the psychological problems associated with manned spaceflights, possible countermeasures for these problems are discussed and a comprehensive concept for implementing these countermeasures is outlined. Counter- measures include (1) different strategies of psychological selection of individual astronauts as well as entire space crews, (2) possible pre-flight training activities in order to prepare individual astro- nauts or whole space crews for their (common) stay in space, and (3) possibilities to provide psychological support during the actual mission, selection and training activities in space programs. The description and discussion of countermeasures is complemented by two case reports which provide detailed descriptions of applications of some of the proposed countermeasures (1) in the context of prepara- tion of German astronauts for a shuttle-flight, and (2) in the con- text of a European simulation study of a long term space mission (EXEMSI'92).