Psychology of Space Exploration
ABSTRACT
To provide for crewmember well-being on future exploration missions, under-
standing coping strategies that International Space Station (ISS) crewmembers
adopt to mitigate the inherent stress of long-duration confinement is important.
A recent retrospective survey of flown astronauts found that the most commonly
reported psychologically enriching aspects of spaceflight had to do with their per-
ceptions of Earth. ISS crewmembers photograph Earth both volitionally and in
response to requests from Crew Earth Observations (CEO) scientists. Automatically
recorded data from the camera can be used to test hypotheses about factors corre-
lated with self-initiated crewmember photography. The present study used these
objective in-flight data to investigate the nature of voluntary photographic activity.
We examined the distribution of photographs with respect to time, crew, and sub-
ject matter. We determined whether the frequency fluctuated in conjunction with
major mission events such as vehicle dockings and extravehicular activities (EVAs,
or spacewalks), relative to the norm for the relevant crew. We also examined the
influence of geographic and temporal patterns on frequency of Earth photography
activities. We tested the hypotheses that there would be peak photography inten-
sity over locations of personal interest, as well as on weekends.
Of nearly 200,000 photographs taken on eight ISS expeditions, 84.5 percent
were crew-initiated. Once a crewmember went to the window for a CEO request,
he or she was more likely to take photographs for his or her own interest. Fewer
self-initiated images were taken during and immediately preceding major station
events. Crewmembers were more likely to take self-initiated images during peri-
ods when they had more free time. Analysis indicated some phasing in patterns of
photography during the course of a mission, although it did not suggest that psy-
chological functioning was lower during the third quarter of confinement (i.e., no
third-quarter effect was found). Earth photography is a self-initiated positive activ-
ity of possible importance for salutogenesis (increase in well-being) of astronauts
on long-duration missions. Scientific requests for photography through CEO play
an important role in facilitating crew-initiated photography. Consideration should
be given to developing substitute activities for crewmembers in future exploration
missions where there will not be the opportunity to look at Earth, such as on long-
duration transits to Mars.