Empathy Levels of Dentistry Students in Peru and Argentina

Abstract

Objectives: To compare the empathy of students in two faculties of Dentistry in Peru and Argentina, three factors were considered: universities, academic year and gender. Material and Methods: Empathy matrices in Dentistry students were measured using the Jefferson Scale of Empathy, culturally validated in Peru and Argentina. Empathy data were compared among and within the faculties tested using a three-factor analysis of variance (model III), a Duncan test, and a discriminant analysis. The level of significance used was less than 0.05. Results: We found that differences existed between the students tested. The comparison between the levels of empathy in the studied factors and the presence of unexplained variance showed that empathy was able to differentiate populations. Conclusions: The results indicate variability in the empathy values associated with the factors studied. The discriminant test confirms the differences between faculties revealed by the data matrix resulting from the JSE. These differences are possibly due to the effect of educational and social factors.

Reconsidering the ‘Decline’ of Dental Student Empathy within the Course in Latin America

“…The variability of the empathic response has also been previously observed, by other authors, in the gender variable in students of Dentistry [19][20][21][22] and Medicine. 23 The results observed in this study are consistent with those obtained by the authors mentioned above in terms of the existence of variability of empathic response that seems to be a rule rather than an exception [22][23][24][25][26][27][28] and shows the existence of different models for presentation of the means of empathy within the course estimated in consecutive academic years.…”

“…[19][20][21] In Table 1 the results of the application of regression to the mean values of empathy within the course of the five academic years studied in each of the universities examined are shown. It was found that most of means of the courses at the universities respond to a single type which was cubical, and only one university, a quadratic type (University of San Marcos, Peru).…”

“…Other authors published the data in this study. [18][19][20] The study population consisted of students belonging to the courses from the first to fifth year of the undergraduate degree program of Dentistry of eighteen Dental Faculties in six countries in Latin America (Dominican Republic, Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia, Argentina and Chile) (n total = 4407). [19][20][21] The Jefferson Scale of Physician Empathy (JSPE), the Spanish version for medical students (S), adapted and validated (for cultural form and content), specially for dental students in all the countries studied by criterion of judges, was applied to all students.…”

“…[18][19][20] The study population consisted of students belonging to the courses from the first to fifth year of the undergraduate degree program of Dentistry of eighteen Dental Faculties in six countries in Latin America (Dominican Republic, Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia, Argentina and Chile) (n total = 4407). [19][20][21] The Jefferson Scale of Physician Empathy (JSPE), the Spanish version for medical students (S), adapted and validated (for cultural form and content), specially for dental students in all the countries studied by criterion of judges, was applied to all students. [19][20][21] The primary and original data from the empathy levels within the course of each university examined were analyzed by the Cronbach's alpha test (reliability by internal consistency); the sum of the primary data score, obtained using the scale previously mentioned, were initially analyzed by the Kolmogorov-Smirnov normality test (K-S) in both types and to the Homoscedasticity Levene test and the effect size was measured by the Hedges (g).…”

“…[19][20][21] The Jefferson Scale of Physician Empathy (JSPE), the Spanish version for medical students (S), adapted and validated (for cultural form and content), specially for dental students in all the countries studied by criterion of judges, was applied to all students. [19][20][21] The primary and original data from the empathy levels within the course of each university examined were analyzed by the Cronbach's alpha test (reliability by internal consistency); the sum of the primary data score, obtained using the scale previously mentioned, were initially analyzed by the Kolmogorov-Smirnov normality test (K-S) in both types and to the Homoscedasticity Levene test and the effect size was measured by the Hedges (g). [18][19][20][21][22] The means of academic years, from first to fifth, in each of the universities were obtained from the aforementioned works [18][19][20] and tested for polynomial regression to determine the type of curve an analysis of variance sequentially.…”