Space & the perception of time

 

 

TWO astronauts marooned in space may sound like the plot of a Hollywoodblockbuster,but for two NASA crew members, it is nowareality. Commander Barry Wilmore and pilot Sunita Williams are currently in limbo on the International Space Station (ISS). They arrived in the Boeing Starliner spacecraft – the first testof thespaceshipwithastronauts. Wilmore and Williams were supposed to stay on the ISS for around eight days and return on the same spacecraft. But there is now debate about the safety of Starliner after it experienced helium leaks and thruster problems on its way to the ISS. In coming days, NASA and Boeing may decide to clear Starliner to carry the astronauts back to Earth. This means their staymightnotlast toomuchlonger.Butifofficials decide against Starliner, the astronauts face waiting an additional six months in orbit before returning. So how do astronauts cope with a potential six-month wait for a lift home? Waiting for thingsis difficult at thebestof times.Undernormal circumstances, it is frustrating, stressful and anxietyprovoking. But in extreme situations, with high stakes, waiting can be purgatory. Part of the reason that waiting is difficult is that it distorts our sense of time.

 

Think of last time you were waiting for a delayed train, test results or a text froma potential new partner. Did it fly by or drag? For most people, time spent waiting crawls at a glacial pace. As a result, delays and periods of anticipation often feel much longer than they actually are. Waiting slows our perceptionof time,becauseitchanges the amount of time that we spend thinking about time. During normal daily life we often ignore time; our brains havealimited capacity. If time isn’timportant,wesimplydon’t think about it, and this helps it to pass quickly. Waiting also slows our perceptionof timebecauseitwhat wedo andhowwe feel.Normal life is busy and full of everchanging activities and interactions. The sudden need to wait halts the flow of life, often leaving us with nothing else to do, thus increasing levels of boredom and frustration. In general, time filled with activity passes more quickly. We all got a taste of this during COVID lockdowns.

 

When we were stuck inside unable to see friends and engage in normal daily activities, the loss of routineanddistractionscaused time to drag for many. For the astronauts stuck on the ISS, anxiety about when theywillreturn,limitedopportunities for activities and fewer opportunities to contact friends and families combine to make their wait to return home feel significantly longer than six months - if it should come to that.However, as academicswhoresearch theeffects of time on human psychology and biology, our ongoing work withcrewmembersatresearch stations in Antarctica aims to shed light on whether waiting inextremeenvironmentsisdifferent to waiting during normal daily life.

 

A year in Antarctica While being stuck for six months on the ISS may sound likemanypeople’sworstnightmare, it is not uncommon for scientists to spend long periods isolated and confined in extreme environments. Every year, organisations such as the Instituto Antártico Argentino (which uses the Belgrano II Antarctic station), the French Polar Institute and the Italian AntarcticProgramme,incooperation with the European Space Agency (which all use Antarctica’sConcordiastation), send crews of people for up to 16months toconductresearch on the frozen continent. During theMarch toOctober polar winter, teams spend six monthsin near darkness – and from May to August, in completedarkness– facingoutside temperatures of up to -60C, wind speeds of 160 km/h (100 mph) and storms which prevent almost all outdoor activity.

 

Limited Internet coverage canalsopreventconstantcommunication with the outside world.For thelast year,wehave researched how life in Antarctica influences people’s experience of time. Each month, we asked crew members how time felt like it was passing in comparison to before their mission. Trapped on base, with limited contact with the outside world, you might expect time to drag. However, our results suggest the opposite may be true. Analysis of crew members’ experiences indicated that being constantly busy with complex tasks such as scientific research helped time to pass swiftly, according to 80% of crew responses. Only 3% of responses indicated that time actually dragged, and these reports occurred when nights were long and there was little to do. These experiences may provide hope for those stuck on the ISS.