#  Balboni: Religion, Spirituality, and the Hidden Curriculum: Medical Student and Faculty Reflections 

 





June 01, 2015

 

 

 **CONTEXT:**Religion and spirituality play an important role in physicians' medical practice, but little research has examined their influence within the socialization of medical trainees and the hidden curriculum.

 **OBJECTIVES:**To explore the role of religion and spirituality as they intersect with aspects of medicine's hidden curriculum.

 **METHODS:**Semi-scripted, one-on-one interviews and focus groups (N=33 respondents) were conducted to assess Harvard Medical School student and faculty experiences of religion/spirituality and the professionalization process during medical training. Utilizing grounded theory, theme extraction was performed with interdisciplinary input (medicine, sociology, and theology), yielding a high inter-rater reliability score (kappa = 0.75).

 **RESULTS:**Three domains emerged where religion and spirituality appear as a factor in medical training. First, religion/spirituality may present unique challenges and benefits in relation to the hidden curriculum. Religious/spiritual respondents more often reported to struggle with issues of personal identity, increased self-doubt, and perceived medical knowledge inadequacy. However, religious/spiritual participants less often described relationship conflicts within the medical team, work-life imbalance, and emotional stress arising from patient suffering. Second, religion/spirituality may influence coping strategies during encounters with patient suffering. Religious/spiritual trainees described using prayer, faith, and compassion as means for coping whereas non-religious/spiritual trainees discussed compartmentalization and emotional repression. Third, levels of religion/spirituality appear to fluctuate in relation to medical training, with many trainees experiencing an increase in religiousness/spirituality during training.

 **CONCLUSION:**Religion/spirituality has a largely unstudied but possibly influential role in medical student socialization. Future study is needed to characterize its function within the hidden curriculum.

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 **\[Continued in .pdf below\]**



 

 

 

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 Attachments- [  picture\_as\_pdf  hidden\_curriculum.pdf ](/sites/g/files/omnuum11836/files/rshm/files/hidden_curriculum.pdf)
 
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 See also:- [ Faculty Research ](/faculty-research/faculty-research)
- [ More Faculty Research ](/facultyresearch/more)
 
 

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