Faculty Perceptions of Appropriate Faculty Behaviors in Social Interactions With Student Pharmacists

Abstract

Objective. To determine faculty and administrator perceptions about appropriate behavior in social interactions between pharmacy students and faculty members. Methods. Four private and 2 public colleges and schools of pharmacy conducted focus groups of faculty members and interviews with administrators. Three scenarios describing social interactions between faculty members and students were used. For each scenario, participants reported whether the faculty member's behavior was appropriate and provided reasons for their opinions. Results. Forty-four percent of those surveyed or interviewed considered interactions between faculty members and pharmacy students at a bar to be a boundary violation. Administrators were more likely than faculty members to consider discussing other faculty members with a student to be a boundary violation (82% vs. 46%, respectively, P ,0.009). A majority (87%) of faculty members and administrators considered ''friending'' students on Facebook a boundary violation. Conclusions. There was no clear consensus about whether socializing with students at a bar was a boundary violation. In general, study participants agreed that faculty members should not initiate friendships with current students on social networks but that taking a student employee to lunch was acceptable.

Student Pharmacist, Pharmacy Resident, and Graduate Student Perceptions of Social Interactions With Faculty Members

“…Two of the scenarios were based on previous work by the investigators, and an additional scenario about "tagging" pictures in social media was created. 12 The first scenario involved a faculty member friending a student or resident (depending on the members of the focus group), on Facebook and then talking to the student or resident about his or her personal relationships. The second scenario involved faculty members and students or residents at a national conference going to a bar for drinks after a reception and concurrently engaging in conversation regarding academic or practice experience performance and the behavior of other students or residents.…”

“…Faculty members felt strongly that they should not purchase drinks for student pharmacists. 12 Whether student opinions differ is not known.…”

Nurse educators’ experiences with student incivility: a meta-synthesis of qualitative studies

“…Maintaining professional faculty-student boundaries seems to be a prerequisite for civil interactions and a pedagogical relationship [16]. When a boundary is breached, the power of the faculty member as an expert is lessened, and accordingly the probability of student incivility is likely to increase [42]. Further studies are therefore needed to identify the appropriate distance that should be maintained between faculty and students, and how different boundaries influence faculty-student interactions and learning outcomes.…”

The State of Social Media Policies in Higher Education

“…Indeed, developing social media policies for corporations, and the appropriate scope and content of those policies, is such a significant issue that no less than the United States Federal National Labor Relations Board has issued a report analyzing legal cases in which employers' social media policies came under question, and providing guidance for developing a legally compliant social media policy [ 18 ]. Legal necessity may also be the driver in the analysis of the role of social media in the health education environment (e.g., [ 19 ] [ 20 ] [ 21 ]). The extant literature in this area focuses on how social networking has been used and the potential ethical dilemmas of this use (e.g., [ 22 ]).…”