Are engineering students less empathetic than students in the caring
professions? Yes, the findings from a study performed at Linköping University
indicate that this is the case. The study comprises more than 200 students from
six different study programs and was carried out by Chato Rasoal, a researcher
in psychology, together with two colleagues.
The researchers measured empathy with a well-established questionnaire that
shows, for example, the degree of imagination, the ability to assume the
perspective of others, and whether the subject cares about others, along with
the subject´s own worries and anxiety.
"Empathy can have both a cognitive and an emotional aspect," explains Chato
Rasoal. The capacity to see things from the point of view of others is primarily
cognitive, while caring about others is a more emotional component.
Earlier research has shown that engineers have a lower degree of empathy than
future doctors and nurses. This may seem perfectly natural, after all, you don't
need much empathy to work with machines and calculations, do you? But Chato
Rasoal doesn´t agree.
"Advanced engineers often take on leading positions in companies, where they
have to be able to lead teams involving many co-workers. This requires both good
communication skills and social competence. In today´s global business world you
also need intercultural competence, an ability to communicate and collaborate
with people from entirely different cultures."
The students responses evinced clear differences between caring-profession
students and engineers. The latter had considerably lower scores. However, the
differences were mitigated when the data was adjusted for gender. It´s well
known that women are more empathetic than men.
Two groups of engineers participated, students of computer engineering and
applied physics. For the latter a marked difference compared with caring
students remained even after adjusting for gender differences.
For computer engineering students, the differences were largely eliminated.
The researchers have a theory about why: the computer engineering students are
taught with PBL, problem-based learning, which is not the case for the applied
physics students. Chato Rasoal believes this can influence the degree of
empathy.
"In problem-based learning you work in groups a lot. You have to be able to
listen to others and accept other people´s thoughts and expressions of emotions.
Otherwise it won´t work."
In a currently ongoing study they want to see if this theory can be
confirmed. For five semesters they have followed students of computer
engineering to see whether PBL affects their capacity for empathy. The data are
now being processed.
The findings from the first study have been presented in an article in
European Journal of Engineering Education.
More information: Rasoal, C., Danielsson, H. and Jungert, T. Empathy
among students in engineering programmes, European Journal of Engineering
Education, Vol. 37, Iss. 5, 2012, DOI:
10.1080/03043797.2012.708720
Provided by Linköping University
"Engineers less empathetic, study finds." January 18th, 2013. http://phys.org/news/2013-01-empathetic.html
Posted by
Robert Karl Stonjek
Robert Karl Stonjek
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