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Can Virtual Humans Teach Empathy?

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Teaching Empathy in Healthcare

Abstract

Millennial and generation X learners seek and accept technology-based teaching. In healthcare, such technology includes virtual standardized patients. Virtual human technology was created and tested to teach communication skills, including empathy, in patient encounters. With the help of learners as content experts (dental, medical, speech pathology, and pharmacy students and faculty), our team developed virtual standardized patient scenarios related to neurology, surgery, mental health, and other medical specialties, to offer practice opportunities for history taking, critical thinking, and empathic communication. We will describe the virtual human technology, including its properties suited to provide immediate empathy feedback in real time, to teach and reinforce empathic communication longitudinally, and to reach a large number of learners who can practice and reinforce the skill repetitively and cost effectively.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Computer and Information Sciences and Engineering Department, College of Engineering, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA

    Benjamin Lok

  2. Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Health, Herbert Wertheim College of Medicine, Florida International University, Miami, FL, USA

    Adriana E. Foster

Authors
  1. Benjamin Lok
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  2. Adriana E. Foster
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Correspondence to Benjamin Lok .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Health, Herbert Wertheim College of Medicine, Florida International University, Miami, FL, USA

    Adriana E. Foster

  2. Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Health, Icahn School of Medicine, Mount Sinai Beth Israel, New York, NY, USA

    Zimri S. Yaseen

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Lok, B., Foster, A.E. (2019). Can Virtual Humans Teach Empathy?. In: Foster, A.E., Yaseen, Z.S. (eds) Teaching Empathy in Healthcare. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-29876-0_9

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