ArticleGMS journal for medical education2022
Does a sense of gratitude protect against empathy loss in medical students? An exploratory study.
Article in GMS journal for medical education, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 1 paper.
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Who cites it
1 citing paper in PubMed, 2 citations in OpenAlex.
- Relationship between medical and general gratitude among medical students: a cross-sectional study.Scientific reports · 2026Article
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Authors and funding
4 authors at 3 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Introduction: The promotion of physicians' empathy (PE) skills in medical school plays a central role in physician-patient communication. However, a significant decline in empathy among medical students during their training has been repeatedly reported. Gratitude could be a possible protective factor for PE. However, as some students do not seem to be affected by this empathy loss, this study explores the relationship between gratitude and PE. Methods: Using validated questionnaires (JSPE-S, IRI and GQ-6), 88 medical students at LMU München evaluated their self-assessed PE and gratitude. In addition, they went through four OSCE stations focusing on general medicine, in which their empathy and communication skills were assessed by simulated patients (SP) and by an assessor using the Berlin Global Rating. Correlations were analysed using Pearson's correlation coefficient and gender differences were analysed using Mann-Whitney U-tests. Results: In the self-assessment, there was a significant, moderate correlation between students' attitude towards empathy (JSPE-S) and their gratitude (GQ-6) and a weak correlation between the IRI subscale "Empathy" and the GQ-6. In terms of the performance-based assessment, there were also weak correlations between PE or communication skills and gratitude. There were no gender-specific differences in the gratitude of the students. Conclusion: We were able to demonstrate a correlational relationship between gratitude and empathy in medical students. Whether gratitude acts causally as a protective or supportive factor for empathy remains open. A causal relationship of gratitude to empathy should therefore be examined in a prospective study design.
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