A big-five personality model-based study of empathy behaviors in clinical nurses

摘要

Empathy is the capacity to understand or feel what another person is experiencing from within the other person's frame of reference. Many studies have shown that enhancement of nurses' empathy capability can promote a good nurse-patient relationship. However, little research investigates the strategies to improve nurses' empathy abilities. This study investigated the characteristics of nurses' personality trait and empathy and explore the correlation between nurses' empathy and personality. A total of 471 nurses participated in this study. This study found that empathy was positively associated with conscientiousness and agreeableness, negatively associated with neuroticism. The personality traits were able to explain 37.5% of the overall variation in empathy capability, while agreeableness and conscientiousness tendency were significantly associated with empathy capability in nurses. Big five personality trait theory is a pretty good model to predict the empathy level of nurses, which could also play a positive role in improving the empathy ability, managing the satisfaction of patients and provision of quality and safe care customized to patients' needs and preferences. In addition, training programs emphasizing emotions, psychology and healthy personality should be strengthened to promote nurses' empathy.