The military service of a number of our Subsim respondents in this thread is certainly a factor in not panicking under stressful circumstances. To that, I would only add that It's also a matter of character as well. Various military branches create psychological profiles of it's service members and do various testing of it's members with regards to creating artificial elements of stressful conditions to see how it's members respond. It's basically part of a vetting process. This is true of it's Special Forces, Aircraft and Submarine operations among many others specialties.
In teaching motorcycle safety to new riders, I have seen this as well. No one can predict what dangers a new rider will face or even those riders who have been riding motorcycles a long time. As part of the curriculum, I routinely stress looking and visually scanning ahead for hidden dangers. I have told them assume cars don't see you and Will pull out in front of you in your lane of travel. Using external lighting and wearing bright colors so you are noticed and seen can minimize those dangers. It's the little things that can reduce stress and give those individuals a nice, pleasant ride.
As in martial arts, once an individual has " muscle memory, " they can move fast with little stimuli. Training makes all the difference. If you look at the events of Apollo 13 where the the service module was dangerously compromised by oxygen canisters exploding and the 3 astronauts very lives were in serious jeopardy. This is an example of days of stressful conditions with very little if any sleep.
Working together and the military way of breaking a large problem into small pieces certainly saved the day along with some luck in bringing those astronauts home. Certainly their respective intelligence and training and the way they all handled stress played a role in bringing them home safely.
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