How to Become an Astronaut
This article was firs published on: Psychology Today.
Key points
- How can we enable children to experience what astronauts have experienced in space?
- A custom-made rocket ship launches school children into space in virtual reality.
- Research has shown that children experience the Overview Effect, the feeling of becoming an ambassador for planet Earth.
- Not only do children experience the Overview Effect, but they also experience learning gains from the virtual reality simulation.
When astronauts floating in space look down on planet Earth, they reported experiencing a feeling that has often been described as the Overview Effect. This sensation can best be defined as a feeling of awe, a claustrophobic feeling accompanied by the awareness that if we mess up that blue marble down there in the vastness of space, that is it. It is all over.
Since 1961, a little over 550 people have seen that blue marble called planet Earth from space. Only 24 have seen our planet from an even larger distance, growing smaller and smaller in the vastness. How can our younger generations experience what, so far, a selected few have experienced? Would it be possible to create ambassadors for planet Earth in children by having them experience the Overview Effect?
That is a question the non-profit organization SpaceBuzz took up.
They wondered how to launch a million children across the world into space and have them experience the Overview Effect. The answer they found was to build a custom-made rocket ship and have classrooms of children be launched into space... in virtual reality.
This exciting educational program consists of a pre-flight, a flight, and a post-flight program. In the pre-flight program at school, children learn how to write an application letter to become an astronaut. They also learn how to experience gravity by hanging upside down on a horizontal bar, they put together a puzzle with oven mitts to experience what astronauts experience when manipulating objects, and they solve a variety of simple math, geography, and language problems.
Once these children pass the pre-flight astronaut training—and don’t tell the secret, but everybody passes the training—a rocket ship arrives in front of their school. The rocket ship is horizontally mounted on a truck. There is no doubt it is a rocket ship. Its shape and size make it obvious. The fuel engines are clearly visible, the signature from European Space Agency astronaut André Kuipers marks its space status, and the SpaceBuzz crew welcomes the new astronauts.
Groups of children enter the rocket ship and sit down in the specially designed astronaut seats. They put on their space virtual reality headset, put on their headphones, and prepare for launch. Two-time International Space Station astronaut Kuipers will guide them on their journey as the captain of the spaceship.
The countdown starts, the engines turn on, and the young astronauts feel their seats move for launch. After the excitement of the launch, they enter into an orbit around the Earth. The noise and fumes from the launch have become the silence and clarity of space.
To make viewing more comfortable, the chairs move again, and the young astronauts see planet Earth, their home. Kuipers tells them about the wonders of the Earth, the oceans, the Northern lights, and the Amazon rainforest while they circle the planet. Once their journey comes to an end, the doors close again, and they make themselves ready to land and safely arrive back home.
The SpaceBuzz program is not only an exhilarating experience for any child (and teacher and parent), but it also offers endless opportunities for research in the cognitive sciences. Do children actually experience the Overview Effect, and how would we measure this? And given the educational nature of the SpaceBuzz program, does the virtual reality simulation yield learning gains?
My research team has started the scientific journey to answer these questions.
For instance, in one experiment, we tested some hundred children on a range of measures, including whether they experienced awe, the Overview Effect, and learning gains. For starters, we used questionnaires, even though we are currently conducting neurophysiological studies, to determine whether we can replicate the findings online.
The findings showed great promise. First of all, we found evidence for learning gains in children by comparing results from a test prior to the launch and after the landing. But a so-called “structural equation model” that represented how awe, the Overview Effect, and learning gains were thought to be causally structurally related to one another demonstrated more. Because of the experience of an awe effect, children experienced the Overview Effect, and because they experienced the Overview Effect, they experienced learning gains. And rest assured, not the other way around. Apparently, if learners are in awe of the content, they learn.
Now, if the SpaceBuzz program shows learning gains, it offers great promise not only for young space travelers in virtual reality but also for the future of education. Think about it. The virtual reality simulation could become adaptive to the learner, problem-solving could take place in virtual reality simulations, and pressures in the current classroom can be relieved by these complementary technologies.
But for now, SpaceBuzz is traveling the world. Having visited the United States, the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, and Hungary, we have reached some 50,000 children already and are still counting. Counting the new ambassadors for planet Earth!
References
Louwerse, M. (2021). Keeping those words in mind: How language creates meaning. Rowman & Littlefield.
van Limpt-Broers, H. A. T., Postma, M., & Louwerse, M. M. (2020). Creating ambassadors of planet earth: the overview effect in K12 education. Frontiers in Psychology, 11, 2548.