Peter Maschke

How Do Astronaut Candidate Profiles Differ From Airline Pilot Profiles? Results From the 2008/2009 ESA Astronaut Selection

Sixteen years after the second Europe-wide astronaut selection campaign, the European Space Agency started the third campaign by putting out a call for new astronauts in 2008. Due to extreme environmental conditions, expensive scientific experiments, and high public interest, not only are the psychological requirements on a high level, but they are also wide in variety: Besides cognitive and psychomotor requirements, greater importance than in comparable campaigns was put on personality and behavioral aspects, especially regarding interpersonal aspects. The psychological selection was conducted in two steps: Phase 1 concentrated mainly on performance tests and Phase 2 focused on personality and interpersonal behavior. Out of the 902 tested candidates, 46 fulfilled the psychological requirements. Significant differences were found between the astronaut candidates and the general population as well as airline pilot candidates.

Differences in Monitoring between Experts and Novices

In the future of aviation, operators will have to work with highly automated systems. This necessitates operators monitoring appropriately (OMA). A theoretical model for adequate monitoring behavior was developed and eye movement parameters were defined to identify OMA. The present eye-tracking study focused on differences in monitoring behavior between experts (experienced pilots and air traffic controllers) and job applicants. Results from 21 experts and 33 applicants are reported.