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Organizational Behavior Management Approaches to Advancing Compassionate Care in Research and Practice

  • SI: Compassion in Applied Behavior Analysis
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Abstract

Compassion in health care has been associated with improved patient outcomes, better treatment adherence, patient engagement, and satisfaction. However, much of this literature is limited by weak design and measurement strategies. Despite researchers’ efforts to demystify compassion and produce an evidence-based understanding of it, empirical models and definitions remain a work in progress. In this article, we discuss how contemporary methodological features of organizational behavior management (OBM) could be used to advance our understanding of compassionate care and its impact on important outcomes for patients, clinicians, and organizations alike. Recommendations for measuring, assessing, and intervening at both the individual and systems-level to promote compassionate care are provided. Though the origin, development, and maintenance of compassion may be complex, it is clear that behavior analysts have an ethical obligation to invoke compassion in their service to others. Likewise, those at the executive level of decision making in organizations have an obligation to purposefully design environments that support behavior analysts’ engagement in compassionate care. Viewing compassionate care through a systems lens may help to align the values and goals of patients, clinicians, and organizations by treating compassion like a critical business metric.

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Data sharing is not applicable to this article as no new data were created or analyzed in this study.

Notes

  1. Within the Ethics Code for Behavior Analysts, the second core principle states that behavior analysts shall treat others with compassion, dignity, and respect (BACB, 2020). Within the American Medical Association principles of medical ethics, the first core principle states that a physician shall be dedicated to providing competent medical care, with compassion and respect for human dignity and rights (American Medical Association, 2001).

  2. Neuroimaging research provides evidence for differential neural plasticity associated with these two emotions, implicating two distinguishable networks at the brain level (Klimecki et al., 2014).

  3. We thank an anonymous reviewer for highlighting this point.

  4. As noted by Rohrer and Weiss (2022) the compassionate care behaviors rated as most important to caregivers are likely to vary across regions and cultures. The available social validity data on compassionate care behavior in ABA represents a U.S.-centric perspective. Future research should consider surveying caregivers using items that are tailored to the consumers’ cultural norms, incorporating cultural sensitivity even across regions within the United States or within the same organization.

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Correspondence to Kristin M. Hustyi.

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Hustyi, K.M., Hays, T.N. Organizational Behavior Management Approaches to Advancing Compassionate Care in Research and Practice. Behav Analysis Practice (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40617-024-00927-z

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40617-024-00927-z

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