Third and fourth year medical students’ attitudes about and experiences with callousness: the good, the bad and the ambiguous

Abstract

Background: This study solicits third and fourth year medical students’ attitudes about and experiences with callousness.

Methods: Medical students were asked to respond to an on-line survey assessing demographic information, their experiences with seeing callousness modeled by mentors and their attitudes about callousness. Participants included 74 students roughly split on gender and year in school.

Results: A 2 × 2 between-subjects MANOVA was conducted (dependent variables—attitudes about and experiences with callousness; independent variables—gender and year in school). Significant results were found for gender; follow-up analyses revealed that women hold more unfavorable attitudes about callousness than men. Although students generally regarded callousness as undesirable, they reported seeing callousness modeled by their mentors 20% of the time across a variety of situations.

Conclusions: Students’ attitudes about callousness are negative; women's attitudes are more negative than men's. Despite this, students (regardless of their demographic variations) regularly see it modeled by their mentors. Some students’ narrative responses suggest they think being callous toward patients and colleagues can serve them well in some situations. The authors offer several questions to motivate further empirical and ethical inquiry into callousness and urge medical educators to consider its influence on students’ conceptions of professionalism.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Christy A. Rentmeester

CHRISTY A. RENTMEESTER, PhD is Assistant Professor at the Center for Health Policy and Ethics at Creighton University Medical Center. Her research interests focus upon intersections of moral theory and social and political philosophy, mental health ethics and upon developing new ways of drawing upon humanities in cultivating healthcare professionalism.

Amy Badura Brack

AMY BADURA BRACK, PhD is Associate Professor of Psychology at Creighton University specializing in health psychology. She is interested in psychology pedagogy and in various health psychology issues, including chronic pain and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

Michael G. Kavan

MICHAEL G. KAVAN, PhD is Associate Dean for Student Affairs in the Creighton University School of Medicine. His professional interests include the study of depression, adherence to therapeutic regimens, chronic pain and behavioral medicine.