Student, Faculty, and Clinician Perspectives on Professional Behavior in Physical Therapy
Purpose/Hypothesis: Although published literature describes attempts to teach professional behavior to physical therapy students, there is little research on how physical therapy students, academic faculty, and clinicians view and define professionalism. Based on conversations at professional physical therapy meetings and conferences, it appears that faculty and clinician concerns regarding student behavior may represent a disconnect between how students, faculty, and clinicians perceive professional behavior. The primary objective of this study was to compare perceptions of professional and unprofessional behavior among physical therapy students, faculty, and clinicians.
Number of Subjects: 117 physical therapy clinicians, 18 physical therapy faculty, and 14 physical therapy students
Materials and Methods: A Qualtrics questionnaire was emailed to the Director of Clinical Education (DCE) at all Commission on Accreditation in Physical Therapy Education accredited PT programs in Delaware, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey. Each DCE was asked to share the survey link with other faculty and students in their PT program. The questionnaire was also sent to all PT clinicians practicing in DE, PA, and NJ who had participated in clinical education with the DPT program of the primary researcher. The questionnaire included two open-ended questions which asked respondents to give examples of PT student behavior that the respondent regarded as professional behavior and as unprofessional behavior. The questionnaire also included close-ended demographic questions. Responses to the open-ended questions were qualitatively analyzed using an exploratory approach with applied thematic analysis. Multiple researchers participated in qualitative analysis.
Results: Five themes emerged related to student, faculty, and clinician examples of professional behavior: Excellence; Communication; Responsibility to the Profession; Objective, Non-Biased Behavior; and Approach to Care. The themes of Communication and Responsibility to the Profession were found most frequently among clinicians and students; Excellence and Communication were found most frequently among faculty responses.
Conclusions: Each identified theme was reflected in all three participant groups’ responses. The responses among the groups were more similar than anticipated. This research indicates that differing expectations of professional behavior may not account for reported concerns about student professional behavior. Future research should investigate the importance that each group places on professional behavior. In addition, future research should ensure a more even distribution of respondents in the three participant groups.
Clinical Relevance: It is important that physical therapy students, faculty, and clinicians share expectations of professionalism in order to demonstrate and assess professional behavior. It is anticipated that cohesiveness in the expectations of professionalism among students, faculty, and clinicians would promote positive workplace culture and improved patient satisfaction