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MEDICAL STUDENT ATTITUDES TOWARD THE GERIATRIC PATIENT *
Author(s) -
Spence Donald L.,
Feigenbaum Elliott M.,
Fitzgerald Faith,
Roth Janet
Publication year - 1968
Publication title -
journal of the american geriatrics society
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.992
H-Index - 232
eISSN - 1532-5415
pISSN - 0002-8614
DOI - 10.1111/j.1532-5415.1968.tb02727.x
Subject(s) - socialization , prejudice (legal term) , medicine , medical school , population , class (philosophy) , test (biology) , set (abstract data type) , gerontology , family medicine , significant difference , medical education , social psychology , psychology , paleontology , environmental health , artificial intelligence , computer science , biology , programming language
A bstract Questionnaires designed to test attitudes toward old people were given to both the freshman class and the senior class of students in the University of California School of Medicine. Results of the study showed that these two groups shared most of the general societal conceptions and misconceptions about the aged. In addition, these students adhered to a set of medical stereotypes about aging to a degree surprisingly unmodified by the much‐vaunted medical socialization process; freshmen and seniors agreed on many aspects of the subject. The results of this attitudinal status were manifested in a medical prejudice against old patients, as expressed in the replies given to the questionnaire. How much of the difference observed between the attitudes of the freshmen and the seniors was due to non‐medical acculturative influences (such as the demographic characteristics unique to each group) and how much to the medical socialization procedure, was difficult to ascertain. More significant, however, was the lack of difference between the two student classes and the failure of three years of medical education to mitigate factors injurious to a major and growing segment of the population—aged patients.