Abstract
Effective interventions to support compassionate patient- and self-care requires an understanding of how to best assess compassion. Micro-ecological momentary assessment (micro-EMA), a method in which participants provide brief responses in real-time within their own environments, can capture changes in compassion across time and contexts. This study examined a micro-EMA approach for measuring the temporal dynamics of compassion in medical students during the COVID-19 pandemic. Medical students (N = 47) completed demographic information and self-report questionnaires assessing empathy and compassion for self and others. Participants then completed six bursts of micro-EMA smartphone-delivered surveys. Each burst was 14 days, with 28 days between bursts. During each burst, participants received four daily micro-EMA surveys assessing compassion, stress, positive affect, and negative affect. Dynamic structural equation modeling was used to examine micro-EMA responses. The overall micro-EMA response rate was 83.75%. On average, daily compassion did not significantly change across the academic year. However, there was significant within-person variability in medical students’ compassion trajectories over the training year (b = 0.027, p < .01). At concurrent timepoints, micro-EMA assessed compassion was associated with greater happiness (b = 0.142, p < .001) and lower stress (b = −0.052, p < .05) but was not associated with sadness. In lagged analyses, higher micro-EMA assessed compassion predicted higher next day happiness (b = 0.116, p < .01) and vice versa (b = 0.185, p < .01). Results suggest it is feasible to use micro-EMA to assess daily levels of compassion among medical students. Additionally, there is wide variability in day-to-day fluctuations in compassion levels among medical students, with some students showing substantial increases in daily compassion across the training year and others showing decreases. Positive affect as opposed to negative affect may have particularly strong associations with compassion. Further examination of antecedents and consequences of fluctuations in daily compassion could inform potent intervention targets.
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Funding
Dr. Wooldridge is supported by a Career Development Award [1IK2RX003634] from the United States (U.S.) Department of Veterans Affairs Rehabilitation Research and Development Service. Dr. Herbert is supported by a Career Development Award [1IK2RX002807] from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs Rehabilitation Research and Development Service. This study was funded by a seed grant from the Center for Empathy and Technology in the T. Denny Sanford Institute for Empathy and Compassion at UC San Diego.
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JSW: conceptualization of the study, lead on manuscript drafting and editing, approval of final version. ES: lead on analysis and interpretation of the data, manuscript drafting and editing, approval of final version. TF: study coordination and data collection, manuscript drafting and editing, approval of final version. RCM: manuscript drafting and editing, approval of final version. LTE: manuscript drafting and editing, approval of final version. MSH: acquisition of funding, conceptualization of the study, data analysis and interpretation, manuscript drafting and editing, approval of final version.
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Dr. Raeanne C. Moore is a co-founder of KeyWise AI and a consultant for NeuroUX. Jennalee S. Wooldridge, Emily Soriano, Tess F. Filip, and Lisa T. Eyler, Matthew S. Herbert declare that they have no conflict of interest.
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Wooldridge, J.S., Soriano, E., Filip, T.F. et al. Compassion Dynamics in Medical Students: An Ecological Momentary Assessment Study. J Clin Psychol Med Settings (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10880-024-10003-x
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10880-024-10003-x