Artículo
Are there differences in health professionals’ empathy due to academic and clinical experience?
Fecha de publicación:
06/09/2018
Editorial:
Springer
Revista:
Current Psychology
ISSN:
1046-1310
e-ISSN:
1936-4733
Idioma:
Inglés
Tipo de recurso:
Artículo publicado
Clasificación temática:
Resumen
The health professional’s empathy has a positive effect on treatment outcomes and the well-being of both patients and professionals. The aim of this research was to assess the empathy levels of first-year medical and psychology students and to compare these levels with those of trained psychologists and physicians. In addition, we also analysed the potential effects of years of professional practice and the average number of patients treated on the empathy of professionals. We evaluated cognitive and emotional empathy through the Interpersonal Reactive Index and the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Task. The results showed that perspective taking in medical students was lower than that of psychotherapists, and psychotherapists and physicians reported lower levels of personal distress than psychology students. We did not find evidence of general detrimental effects of clinical experience on the capacity to feel sympathy and compassion towards others, but we did find lower empathic concern levels in those professionals with higher workloads. Considering that these effects have been seldom studied among psychologists, additional longitudinal research might indicate how empathy is influenced by training over time. On the other hand, since emotional distress can be detrimental to the professional’s performance, our results suggest that empathy needs to be promoted and trained, in order to preserve the ability to feel with others without falling into an extreme of emotional distress.
Palabras clave:
EMPATHY
,
EXPERIENCE
,
PHYSICIANS
,
PSYCHOLOGISTS
,
STUDENTS
Archivos asociados
Licencia
Identificadores
Colecciones
Articulos(INCIHUSA)
Articulos de INST. DE CS. HUMANAS, SOC. Y AMBIENTALES
Articulos de INST. DE CS. HUMANAS, SOC. Y AMBIENTALES
Citación
Putrino, Natalia Inés; Tabullo, Angel Javier; Mesurado, Maria Belen; Richaud, Maria Cristina; Are there differences in health professionals’ empathy due to academic and clinical experience?; Springer; Current Psychology; 6-9-2018; 1-8
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