Business scholars for more than 20 years have explored the concept of 鈥渆motional labor,鈥� or the management of emotions to present a certain image in service workers. Now, researchers from the 天美影院Business School and Group Health Cooperative have teamed up to explore how the concept can be applied to the medical profession.
鈥淲e propose that the emotional labor of physicians is characterized by the display of empathy,鈥� said Dr. Eric B. Larson, director of Group Health鈥檚 Center for Health Studies and co- author of a commentary in the March 2 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.
鈥淓mpathy is essential to healing relationships, so it鈥檚 something all health professionals should be expected to show 鈥� even when it鈥檚 hard to do so.鈥�
Drawing from previous research that equates service workers鈥� labor to the work of stage actors, Larson and co-author Xin Yao, a doctoral student in the 天美影院Business School, describe a model for applying acting techniques to the delivery of empathy in doctor-patient interactions. They suggest that doctors use two techniques separately or in combination 鈥� 鈥渄eep acting,鈥� which uses imagination and emotional memories to generate genuine feelings of empathy for the patient, and 鈥渟urface acting,鈥� in which the doctor forges emotional expressions inconsistent with internal feelings. This would allow the doctor to display behaviors the patient can interpret as empathic.
The authors contend that deep acting is preferred because it makes doctors more effective healers. They also believe doctors have greater professional satisfaction and less professional burnout when they practice deep acting, but may have to rely on surface acting when genuine empathy seems impossible. Surface acting may be needed, for example, in situations in which the doctor鈥檚 values or beliefs are entirely different from the patient鈥檚.
“We suggested viewing physician empathy as emotional labor and how doctors can achieve empathy through acting,” said Yao, who did the work for her doctoral dissertation. “Thus, by learning about and consciously engaging oneself in deep acting and surface acting, physicians can be more prepared to meet patients’ needs.”
The authors say doctors need to recognize that their work has an element of emotional labor and to consciously practice deep and surface acting to empathize with their patients. They also recommend long-term, regular training to help doctors develop empathy.
“This will be valuable for both physicians and patients facing the increasingly fragmented and technological world of modern medicine,鈥� they wrote.
鈥淔or patients, our message is that it鈥檚 reasonable to expect physicians to show empathy,鈥� said Larson. 鈥淚t鈥檚 part of the physician鈥檚 job.鈥�
Larson also urged healthcare consumers to seek long-term, continuous relationships with physicians they like.
鈥淭he better the physician knows you, the easier it is to develop an empathic, healing relationship.鈥�