The empathic skill is socially learned: an experimental study with nursing undergraduate students/A habilidade empatica e socialmente aprendida: um estudo experimental com graduandos de enfermagem/La capacidad empatica se aprende socialmente: un estudio experimental con estudiantes de pregrado de enfermeria

The study purpose was to assess a program of empathy promotion for Nursing undergraduate students, which was developed and tested according to the experimental model. 17 students took part in 16 meetings of group training, with three hours of duration each, whereas 16 students formed the control group. The conception of empathy adopted followed a multidimensional perspective that involves cognitive, affective and behavioral dimensions. Participants of both groups were assessed before the intervention, immediately after and within a 30-40 days follow-up. Cognitive and affective empathy components were assessed using an Empathy Inventory. Role-playing was used to assess the verbal empathic behavior. Results are: all the values of the significance tests, p< 0,05, were significant, with higher average values on the experimental group. It is concluded that the program was effective by substantially increasing cognitive and affective empathy aspects, as well as the empathic verbalizing.