Astronauts to Mars will need awareness, experts say

The typical astronaut has a science or math degree, has spent countless hours working as a pilot, and is in good health, but the good things won’t matter to those looking to get to Mars. – they will need “ conscience ”.

A study by Western University found that the heroes of the Space Shroud who wish to survive on the Red Planet will need to have the desire to do the right thing.

This personality trait was also found to outperform others such as “honesty”, “humility”, “emotionality”, “extroversion”, “openness” and “agreeableness”.

Julia McMenamin, PhD candidate in Western Psychology, said: “Consciousness, an individual personality trait, can be viewed as a shared team resource.

“The more conscientious a team, the better it is likely to be at getting things done.

The results come from the four-week AMADEE-18 analog mission, which simulated a Martian environment with isolated and extreme conditions, as well as the exploration of different personality traits to gain insight into the response of aircrews to isolation. during real-world missions.

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NASA is working tirelessly to send the first humans to Mars by 2030 and those chosen for the historic mission will spend time with a small group, in tight spaces and all must work together to survive in the Martian environment.

Because the team will feel isolated and overcrowded, experts warn that conflict is sure to erupt, which has led Western University to investigate the attributes needed to prevent wars from erupting.

Following the four-week experiment, the researchers asked the five astronauts to rate their team, and themselves, on several traits – humility and honesty, emotionality, agreeableness, extroversion, conscience, and openness to the experience. .

Surveys have found that traits such as “social looseness,” or a team member’s habit of exerting less effort when working individually, are down for a desirable trait.

These negative behaviors were found to cause problems within the team and should be “non-negotiable for long space missions,” McMenamin explained.

“ Anyone who has worked in a team knows that conflict between team members can hurt team performance and create a negative experience, ” she said.

“When people argue over how to get things done, or get into personal disagreements, there is less time and energy left to get things done.

“ What is interesting is that there are different types of conflict, and as long as interpersonal issues and arguments about how to perform tasks are avoided, differences of views and opinions can in fact improving team performance, probably because it allows the team to benefit from the knowledge and perspective of each member.

Beyond conflict, acute stress can also negatively impact teams on Earth and in space, McMenamin said.

“Stress creates distractions, contributes to task overload, increases destructive emotions or feelings of anxiety and worry, and makes it difficult for team members to coordinate their work,” he said. she continued.

Since this particular analog mission only lasted about a month, researchers are keen to know how things might turn out during a long-term mission.

“Major problems caused by psychological distress and interpersonal problems do not tend to appear until months, if not years, spent in an isolated, confined and extreme environment, which highlights the need for longer simulations. duration, ”McMenamin said.

NASA astronaut Victor Glover, who recently flew to the International Space Station, discussed the importance of teamwork when conducting long-term space missions.

“This is paramount,” Glover said in an interview with the National Air and Space Museum.

“It’s probably the one thing you’ll come back to more than any other specific science, technology, or system you have to work on in the spaceship or on the surface of another planet.”

“We spend a lot of time training to take care of each other, ourselves and our team in order to accomplish our mission.