The Behavioral Biology of Teams: Multidisciplinary Contributions to Social Dynamics in Isolated, Confined, and Extreme Environments

Abstract

Teams in isolated, confined, and extreme (ICE) environments face many risks to behavioral health, social dynamics, and team performance. Complex long-duration ICE operational settings such as spaceflight and military deployments are largely closed systems with tightly coupled components, often operating as autonomous microsocieties within isolated ecosystems. As such, all components of the system are presumed to interact and can positively or negatively influence team dynamics through direct or indirect pathways. However, modern team science frameworks rarely consider inputs to the team system from outside the social and behavioral sciences and rarely incorporate biological factors despite the brain and associated neurobiological systems as the nexus of input from the environment and necessary substrate for emergent team dynamics and performance. Here, we provide a high-level overview of several key neurobiological systems relevant to social dynamics. We then describe several key components of ICE systems that can interact with and on neurobiological systems as individual-level inputs influencing social dynamics over the team life cycle—specifically food and nutrition, exercise and physical activity, sleep/wake/work rhythms, and habitat design and layout. Finally, we identify opportunities and strategic considerations for multidisciplinary research and development. Our overarching goal is to encourage multidisciplinary expansion of team science through (1) prospective horizontal integration of variables outside the current bounds of team science as significant inputs to closed ICE team systems and (2) bidirectional vertical integration of biology as the necessary inputs and mediators of individual and team behavioral health and performance. Prospective efforts to account for the behavioral biology of teams in ICE settings through an integrated organizational neuroscience approach will enable the field of team science to better understand and support teams who work, live, serve, and explore in extreme environments.

The Evolution and Maturation of Teams in Organizations: Convergent Trends in the New Dynamic Science of Teams

“…Operationally, decisions need to be made about appropriate temporal granularity or resolution for measurement, and how this supports the valid measurement of different phenomena. This includes thinking longitudinally about teams existing and changing over very long periods of time [e.g., research on teams on long duration space exploration missions, (Bell et al, 2019 ); or functioning in other Isolated, Confined and Extreme (ICE) environments; (Landon et al, 2019 )], as well as looking at very “thin slices” of interaction across multiple streams of data (i.e., linguistic and paralinguistic communication, physiological activation, behavior; Rosen et al, 2018 ). There is exciting work in each of these ranges of timescales for team dynamics; however, there is very little that integrates them both.…”

“…It is no longer just individuals nested in teams, but biological attributes and physiological processes nested within individuals within teams within larger organizational entities and time. Landon et al ( 2019 ) provide a wide ranging and integrative review of the topic as it relates to performance within ICE settings, and Stevens et al ( 2019 ) provide a remarkable example of how patterns of physiological activation across team members can be identified and used to predict team outcomes. These articles are exemplars of the emerging area of team physiological dynamics, which has accelerated rapidly in recent years (Kazi et al, 2019 ).…”

“…Context matters, and certain industries have embraced the importance of team dynamics as the links between team functioning and valued organizational outcomes in that industry are particularly salient. Articles in this special address spaceflight (Bell et al, 2019 ; Pendergraft et al, 2019 ) military (Demir et al, 2019 ; Johnston et al, 2019 ), healthcare (Stevens et al, 2019 ), and isolated and confined environments (Landon et al, 2019 ). While this list of industries is by no means exhaustive of those pursuing team-based work strategies or engaged in research efforts to understand and improve team dynamics, it is representative of the key contributors.…”

The efficacy of computer-assisted cognitive behavioral therapy (cCBT) on psychobiological responses and perioperative outcomes in patients undergoing functional endoscopic sinus surgery: a randomized controlled trial

“…Perioperative hemodynamic management can optimize surgical conditions, minimize bleeding, and optimize patient outcomes in FESS (Martin et al 2020 ). Preoperative anxiety influences physiological outputs including increased heart rate, decreased heart rate variability, blunted post-stress systolic blood pressure recovery, and elevated levels of cortisol (Epel, 2020 , Landon et al 2019 ).…”

Evolutionary Stability Analysis of the Coal Mine Safety Management System Governed by Delay and Impulsive Differential Equations

“…e spread of behavior is not limited to the field of social bad behavior, but also spreads in other fields of behavior. Many scholars have also used virus propagation models or system dynamics theories and methods to study the laws of behavioral propagation from different aspects [3][4][5]. e policies of safety management in nowadays China are always adjusted with the occurrence of accidents.…”