ABSTRACT
It is universally acknowledged that empathy is an essential quality in members of the medical and other helping professions, although it is often referred to by other names such as “caring attitude” (e.g., Lown et al., 2007). Selection of students to professional courses therefore requires the identification of those who have the capacity to respond empathically to patients, families, and others. This chapter reviews some of the important issues concerning empathy in medicine, including the conditions that foster it and how to predict it in medical students and medical professionals. We review research carried out by ourselves and others in recent years on methods to measure those aspects of personality that have been found to be related to caring attitudes and behaviors. A particular issue that is addressed is whether it is better to try to identify and select those likely to show a high degree of empathy, or to identify and reject applicants to medicine who have characteristics that are antagonistic to empathy. A tentative model is proposed that takes account such factors as emotional stability, conscientiousness, and self-control, which tend to support the capacity for empathic behaviors in professional people, and some factors such as narcissism that may inhibit them.
