ArticlePatient education and counseling2020
Are clinicians' self-reported empathic concern and perspective-taking traits associated with their response to patient emotions?: Communication Studies.
Article in Patient education and counseling, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 4 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
4 citing papers in PubMed, 12 citations in OpenAlex.
- Values elicitation among surgical oncologists: Findings from an international survey.European journal of surgical oncology : the journal of the European Society of Surgical Oncology and the British Association of Surgical Oncology · 2026Article
- Taxonomy and effectiveness of clinician agenda-setting questions in routine ambulatory encounters: A mixed method study.Patient education and counseling · 2023Article
- From fixer to facilitator: an interpretative phenomenological study of diabetes person-centred counselling and empowerment-based education.F1000Research · 2022Article
- Clinician Response to Patient Emotion: Impact on Subsequent Communication and Visit Length.Annals of family medicineArticle
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
7 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
objectiveTo understand whether clinicians' empathic concern and perspective-taking traits are associated with their response to patient emotions.
methodsWe audio-recorded 41 HIV clinician interactions with 342 patients at two academic medical centers. We assessed clinicians' self-reported empathic concern and perspective-taking traits using the Interpersonal Reactivity Index and coded emotional communication using the Verona Coding Definitions of Emotional Sequences. We used random effects models to assess associations between clinician traits and clinician responses to patients' negative emotions, accounting for clustering of emotions within encounters and patients within clinicians.
resultsClinicians with more self-reported empathic concern received fewer emotional expressions from their patients (β -0.06; 95% CI -0.10, -0.01) and had greater odds of responding to emotions by giving information/advice (OR 1.10; 95% CI 1.01, 1.20). There were no associations between empathic concern or perspective-taking and any other clinician responses.
conclusionClinicians with higher levels of empathic concern respond to patient emotions by giving information and advice, a response traditionally thought of as a missed empathic opportunity, not by exploring emotions or providing empathy. Whether this is helpful to patients is unknown. PRACTICE IMPLICATIONS: Clinicians should be aware of their tendency to give information to patients with emotional distress, and consider whether this response is helpful to patients.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.