title: Psychological training of German science astronauts.
abstract: Although the significance of psychosocial issues of manned space flights has been discussed very often in recent literature, up to now, very few attempts have been made in North-America or Europe to provide astronaut candidates or spacecrew members with some kind of psychological training.  As a first attempt in this field, a psychological training program for science astronauts is described, which has been developed by the German Aerospace Research Establishment and performed as part of the mission-independent biomedical training of the German astronauts' team. In contrast to other training concepts, this training program focused not only on skills needed to cope with psychosocial issues regarding long-term stays in space, but also on skills needed to cope with the different demands during the long pre-mission phase. Topics covered in the training were "Communication and Cooperation", "Stress-Management", "Coping with Operational Demands", "Effective Problem Solving in Groups", and "Problem-Oriented Team Supervision".
authors.affiliation: DLR-Institute of Aerospace Medicine, Dept. of Aviation and Space Psychology, Hamburg, Germany.
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Manzey
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Schiewe
mesh_terms: D000223:Adaptation, Psychological; D000337:Aerospace Medicine; D018480:Astronauts / Q000193:education* / Q000523:psychology*; D003142:Communication; D005858:Germany; D006126:Group Processes; D006801:Humans; D007318:Inservice Training; D007390:International Agencies; D013026:Space Flight / Q000193:education*; D013315:Stress, Psychological