SUPPORTING LUNAR HABITATS ⬦ MARS HABITATS ⬦ DEEP-SPACE AND ORBITAL HABITATS
The average American adult currently spends about 90% of our time indoors. We know with certainty that once humans leave Earth, for the foreseeable future, we will be spending 100% of our time essentially indoors, inside the environments we design.
Taking a salutogenic approach to the design of our environments transitions from meaningful to critical in places where we spend excessive time or complete important tasks --- and especially so in places that traditionally lack (usually not by design-intention) a sense of coherence. Designing our environments to this is critical to support psychological health, well-being, resilience, and extensive other benefits.
Humanity’s current off-world environments --- existing space stations, shuttlecraft, space capsules, etc. --- are extraordinary feats of engineering that are propelling us, as humans, beyond the boundary of our home planet to explore the next great frontier. These marvels shelter and protect us from the fatally extreme natural environments of outer space and extraterrestrial surfaces. They are resolving the immediate, critical path/existential threat to survival and unlocking our potential as a future space-faring civilization. Engineering these environments is the fundamental first step for humans to survive off-Earth.
Next, we must consider designing habitats for humans to not just survive, but thrive, in this new frontier.
To ensure our long-term success off-Earth,
human habitats must be engineered
taking a pathogenic approach
and architecturally designed
with a salutogenic approach.
The engineering of habitats for initial human survival requires an intrinsically pathogenic approach (removing negative conditions) to treat against the constantly hostile environment hazards of outer space. But we will not thrive --- long-term, over years or a lifetime or generations --- in environments only designed to enable survival and support research. The holistic design of habitats, after immediate survival needs have been met, requires a salutogenic strategy: not merely removing the critical hazards, but designing per methods demonstrated to improve health and well-being.
THE IMPERATIVE SPACE ARCHITECTURE STRATEGY
While decades of abundant research are available to inform how the design of the environment affects human performance, behavior, psychological well-being, and physiological health, neuroarchitecture remains an exceptional specialty. Further, common observation indicates a very small fraction of newly constructed buildings take a salutogenic design approach --- though, this fraction is slowly increasing.
This increase is encouraging, as awareness spreads across the industry and (with knowledge, perseverance, and opportunity) eventually evolves into practice. Salutogenic design is a change to our established design paradigms, and change --- even when for the better --- does take time.
But the space architecture sector cannot afford to “reset” to a salutogenic approach a generation after our first off-Earth settlement is built.
We must set the precedent
for humanity's next era of architecture
to prioritize health and well-being in spaces.
These are crucial priorities, as they overlap and impact multiple aspects of long-term human spaceflight. NASA identifies the five hazards of human spaceflight as:
◆ Space radiation
◆ Isolation and confinement
◆ Distance from Earth
◆ Gravity fields
◆ Hostile/closed environments
Which of these hazards should be addressed through the engineering vs. architectural design of a habitat? Which can be addressed through a salutogenic vs. pathogenic approach?
When architecturally deliberately designed, the built environment can foster community and social cohesion to minimize feelings of isolation, change the perception of space from confined to expansive, foster psychological safety in hostile environments, connect us to nature and natural systems where none exists, and more.
"Space architecture” is defined by NASA as the high-level systems, strategies, capabilities, and fundamental infrastructure needed for sustained human-led discovery in deep space. Another more specific, discipline-traditional (and personally biased) interpretation is the overlapping fields of “outer space” and “interior architecture.” At its core, this emerging, narrower subfield will be defined by intrinsically and polarizingly disparate outer vs. interior elements. As with all interior architecture, it will need to work within the boundaries of the environment’s initially engineered core and shell. And to ensure long-term, successful, thriving human habitation in LEO, on the Moon, on Mars, and beyond, it will need to take a salutogenic approach.
--Stephanie Brick, RA, WELL AP, LEED GA
Founder, Salutogenic Design & Consulting Group
Related links: What Is Salutogenic Design?, Consulting, Expert Bio
Salutogenic Design & Space Architecture
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