Development of a novel empathy-related video-feedback intervention to improve empathic accuracy of nursing students: A pilot study. (November 2016)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Lobchuk, Michelle; Halas, Gayle; West, Christina; Harder, Nicole; Tursunova, Zulfiya; Ramraj, Chantal
• Is Part Of: Nurse education today. Volume 46(2016)
• Page Start: 86
• Page End: 93
• Publication Date: 2016-11
• Subjects: Education -- Empathy -- Video-feedback -- Health risk behaviour -- Carers -- Nursing students; Nursing -- Study and teaching -- Periodicals; Education, Nursing -- Periodicals; Soins infirmiers -- Étude et enseignement -- Périodiques; Nursing -- Study and teaching; Periodicals; 610.7307
• DOI: 10.1016/j.nedt.2016.08.034
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0260-6917

Abstract

Abstract: Background: Stressed family carers engage in health-risk behaviours that can lead to chronic illness. Innovative strategies are required to bolster empathic dialogue skills that impact nursing student confidence and sensitivity in meeting carers' wellness needs. Purpose: To report on the development and evaluation of a promising empathy-related video-feedback intervention and its impact on student empathic accuracy on carer health risk behaviours. Design: A pilot quasi-experimental design study with eight pairs of 3rd year undergraduate nursing students and carers. Methods: Students participated in perspective-taking instructional and practice sessions, and a 10-minute video-recorded dialogue with carers followed by a video-tagging task. Quantitative and qualitative approaches helped us to evaluate the recruitment protocol, capture participant responses to the intervention and study tools, and develop a tool to assess student empathic accuracy. Main Results: The instructional and practice sessions increased student self-awareness of biases and interest in learning empathy by video-tagging feedback. Carers felt that students were 'non-judgmental', inquisitive, and helped them to 'gain new insights' that fostered ownership to change their health-risk behaviour. There was substantial Fleiss Kappa agreement among four raters across five dyads and 67 tagged instances. Conclusion: In general, students and carers evaluated the intervention favourably. The results suggest areas of improvement to the recruitment protocol, perspective-taking instructions, video-tagging task, and empathic accuracy tool. Highlights: A novel empathy-related video-feedback approach is proposed. Interactive video-analysis software was employed. 3-phase approach fostered empathy and ownership of health risk behaviours.