Cultural and language backgrounds of International Space Station program personnel
- Paper number
IAC-06-A1.1.03
- Author
Dr. Jennifer Boyd Ritsher, University of California and Veterans Affairs Medical Center, United States
- Coauthor
Dr. Nick Kanas, University of California and Veterans Affairs Medical Center, United States
- Coauthor
Dr. Vyacheslav Salnitskiy, Institute for Biomedical Problems, Russia
- Coauthor
Dr. Vadim Gushin, Institute for Biomedical Problems, Russia
- Coauthor
Ms. Stephanie Saylor, University of California and Veterans Affairs Medical Center, United States
- Coauthor
Dr. Daniel S. Weiss, University of California and Veterans Affairs Medical Center, United States
- Coauthor
Dr. Charles Marmar, University of California and Veterans Affairs Medical Center, United States
- Year
2006
- Abstract
PURPOSE. The International Space Station (ISS) is a joint venture with American, Russian, European, Japanese, and other international partners. This degree of cooperation is unprecedented in human space flight. Because mission safety is at stake, clear communication and trust are essential for ISS personnel working in international and geographically-dispersed teams. It is likely that interest in other cultures, knowledge about other cultures, and foreign language skills would facilitate effective teamwork under these conditions. Therefore, it is important to understand how ISS personnel view cultural and language issues. METHODOLOGY. As part of a larger study of mood and social climate among ISS crewmembers and mission control personnel, we gave participants a questionnaire assessing cultural and language background. The data from this questionnaire are presented here for the first time and are compared against the mood and social climate data. The sample of 132 included 8 US astronauts, 9 Russian cosmonauts, and 95 US and 20 Russian mission control personnel. The analytic strategy included regression methods that accounted for multiple analyses and multiple observations per person, where applicable. Culture and language items were factor analyzed to produce scales, which were tested for internal consistency reliability. These scales showed the degree to which participants reported having social contact with other cultures, being knowledgeable about ISS partner countries, having visited other countries, and having foreign language skills. A summary score provided an estimate of the overall level of cultural sophistication. In addition, the questionnaire included questions that our team had asked in a previous study about the degree to which respondents thought it was important for space program personnel to share a common language. RESULTS. Results showed that the overall level of cultural sophistication was higher among crewmembers than mission control personnel. Russian participants had higher scores than Americans, particularly among mission control personnel. Scores on cultural sophistication were associated with some mood and social climate variables among some subgroups, but most of these relationships were only at the trend level: overall we did not find a strong pattern of association. CONCLUSIONS. American mission control personnel have a lower degree of cultural sophistication than other groups in our study. It is likely that this difference may affect the work of international ISS work teams. Further research is needed to examine the impact of these differences and to assess the nature of cultural training that would be helpful in dealing with them.
- Abstract document
- Manuscript document
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