Behavioral Healthnauts interviewed by Frank White reported “overview effects,” truly transformative
experiences including senses of wonder and awe, unity with nature, transcendence,
and universal brotherhood.^41 More recent testimonials concerning the psycholog-
ical benefits of life in space come from Apollo 14 astronaut Edgar Mitchell and
Shuttle-Mir astronaut-cosmonaut Jerry Linenger.^42 Astronauts and cosmonauts like
the sense of adventure, camaraderie, and grandeur in space.^43
We find hints of long-term physical and mental health benefits to life in chal-
lenging environments. For example, a long-term followup study of Navy person-
nel who had wintered in Antarctica revealed that following their return, they had
undergone fewer hospitalizations than their peers who had identical qualifications
but whose orders to go to the South Pole were rescinded as the result of an arbitrary
administrative decision.^44 Studies of the mental health of cosmonauts conducted
two or three years after their return to Earth found that they had become less anx-
ious, hypochondriacal, depressive, and aggressive.^45 The most plausible explanation
is that during their stay in tough environments, people develop coping skills, that
is, ways of dealing with challenge and stress that continue to serve them well long
after they have returned from their expedition.
It was about the time astronauts began traveling on Mir and the ISS that
greater evidence of psychology began to show in the U.S. space program. NASA’s
Bioastronautics Critical Path Roadmap (BCPR) is one piece of evidence.
Bioastronautics was NASA’s shorthand for life in space, and the BCPR was a frame-
work for identifying the knowledge that NASA needs for future space missions.^46
It identified and assigned priorities to the biomedical and behavioral questions that
must be addressed (and the kinds of countermeasures that must be designed) for
- F. White, The Overview Effect (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1987).
- E. Mitchell and D. Williams, The Way of the Explorer (New York: Putnam, 1996); J. M.
Linenger, Off the Planet (New York: McGraw-Hill, 2000). - Suedfeld, “Invulnerability, Coping, Salutogenesis, Integration.”
- L. A. Palinkas, “Group Adaptation and Individual Adjustment in Antarctica: A Summary
of Recent Research,” in From Antarctica to Outer Space, ed. Harrison et al., pp. 239–252. - V. I. Myasnikov and I. S. Zamaletdinov, “Psychological States and Group Interaction of
Crew Members in Flight,” in Humans in Spaceflight, ed. C. L. Huntoon, V. Antipov, and A. I.
Grigoriev, vol. 3, bk. 2 (Reston, VA: AIAA, 1996), pp. 419–431. - Bioastronautics Critical Path Roadmap, available at http://bioastroroadmap.nasa.gov/index.jsp
(accessed 30 March 2008).