A Randomized Controlled Study on the Effects of a Documentary on Students’ Empathy and Attitudes towards Older Adults

Abstract

Background

Despite the rapid increase in the size of the geriatric population, no current published literature is available based on the effects of viewing a documentary covering medical and psychosocial issues concerning older adults influencing young people’s empathy and ageism. The aim of the current study was to test whether participants who viewed an original documentary about older adults experiencing physical pain would report lower ageism and higher empathy scores when compared to participants who watched a neutral documentary.

Method

Seventy-seven students (ages 18–29 years) were randomized to either the experimental (pain documentary) or the control (neutral documentary) conditions and given pre- and post-test measures of empathy and ageism.

Results

The results of a series of Profile Analyses (Multivariate Mixed ANOVAs) showed a significant interaction (Wilk’s λ=0.933, F(1,75)=5.389, p=0.023, partial η ²=0.067) between treatment and time (pre- vs. post-viewing the film) for the empathy measure that was confirmed by follow-up t-tests. The latter showed a significant increase in empathy scores for only the experimental group, t(37)=−2.999, p=0.005. However, contrary to the original prediction, this same treatment by time effect was not observed for ageism (Wilk’s λ=0.994, F(1,75)=0.482, p=0.490, partial η ²=0.006), as the experimental participants did not significantly reduce their ageism scores, t(38)=0.725, p=0.473. The results of these analyses, as well as those obtained by using the subscales of each questionnaire, have been discussed.

Conclusions

The findings of this preliminary study indicate that showing a pain-based, anti-bias documentary feature film has the potential to significantly improve empathy towards older adults in university students.

Journal

Journal ID (nlm-journal-id): 101711721

Journal ID (pubmed-jr-id): 46846

Journal ID (nlm-ta): Psychol Cogn Sci

Journal ID (iso-abbrev): Psychol Cogn Sci

Title: Psychology and cognitive sciences : open journal

ISSN (Electronic): 2380-727X

Publication date Nihms-submitted: 30 August 2017

Publication date (Electronic): 20 July 2017

Publication date (Print): 2017

Publication date PMC-release: 31 January 2018

Volume: 3

Issue: 3

Pages: 79-88

Affiliations

[1 ]Psychology Department, California State University Northridge, Northridge, CA 91330, USA

[2 ]Psychological Sciences, University of California, Merced, School of Social Sciences and Humanities, Merced, CA 95340, USA

[3 ]Quantitative Methods in the Social Sciences, University of California, Santa Barbara, Department of Education, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA

Author notes

[* ]Corresponding author: Luciana Laganá, PhD, Professor, Psychology Department, California State University Northridge, Northridge, CA 91330, USA, Tel. [phone], luciana.lagana@ 123456csun.edu

Article

Manuscript ID: NIHMS901186

DOI: 10.17140/PCSOJ-3-127

PMC ID: 5791767

License:

This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Categories

Subject: Article