Fearless Temperament and Overconfidence in an Unsuccessful Special Forces Polar Expedition.

Background: Assessment of the influence of personality and decision processes on the performance of two-person expedition teams has application for the composition of small teams for planetary exploration and potentially responding to off-nominal situations.

Case Report: We studied a two-man Special Forces team with a goal of reaching the North Pole in the shortest amount of time. Both subjects had high scores on measures of leadership/dominance, fearlessness, and achievement, and low scores on harm avoidance (high risk-taking). Differences were noted on scales measuring empathy, agreeableness, extraversion, emotional regulation, and callousness. Individual differences in the primacy of personal values of tradition vs. pleasure-seeking were evident.

Discussion: High dominance traits of both team members, incompatibility in other characteristics and values, and minimal pretraining had a significant impact on the decision to abort the trek because of severe frostbite suffered by one subject. Implications for dyads exploring the Mars surface are discussed.