During the mission, crew member Svetlana Savitskaya became the first woman to ever perform a spacewalk, and the potential Buran space shuttle pilot, Igor Volk, was given spaceflight experience.

[2] The NPO Energia chief decided that the Soviets would get there first, and assembled the Soyuz T-12 crew within a month of NASA's announcement, which included Volk as previously planned.

Judging from this, it appeared that, as reasons to have the Soyuz T-12 mission, achieving the first female spacewalk was more important than gaining experience for a potential Buran crew member.

The appearance of Volk as a crew member caused some, including the British Interplanetary Society magazine Spaceflight, to ask why a test pilot was occupying a Soyuz seat usually reserved for researchers or foreign cosmonauts.

During the Pamirs' stay, the six cosmonauts aboard Salyut 7 also conducted Rezonans tests and collected station air samples.