Deliverables for Exploration


The Neurobehavioral and Psychosocial Factors Team aims to ensure astronaut readiness to perform by developing pre-flight prevention programs to avoid as many risks as possible to individual and group behavioral health during flight, detecting individual and crew problems as early as possible during flight, and applying effective interventions during and after spaceflight.

The Team’s anticipated deliverables for spaceflight include:
  • Improved training for group living and optimal communication between the flight crew and ground team;
  • Methods to enhance communication relative to crew problem-solving;
  • A computer-based system for managing interpersonal conflicts and for self-diagnosis and self-help treatment for depression;
  • Specific selection criteria for optimal crew performance;
  • Automated computer vision for unobtrusive optical recognition of stress;
  • Recommended behavioral and pharmacological treatments for neurobehavioral problems;
  • Technologies for rapid assessment of individual and team performance;
  • Recommendations for habitability strategies for privacy and work effectiveness, and;
  • Techniques to optimize assimilation of crews and families after return.




NASA Astronaut Tom Marshburn takes the 3-minute Psychomotor Vigilance Test (PVT) Self Test during the NEEMO 14 mission. PVT Self Test can determine the extent to which fatigue from high workload, sleep loss and shifted work-rest schedules is affecting the ability to be vigilant, react quickly and avoid both lapses of attention and premature responses. PVT Self Test was renamed "Reaction Self Test" as it advanced to a flight experiment on the International Space Station in 2009.