PSYCHOLOGICAL ISSUES IN MEDICAL EDUCATION: FROM RESEARCH TO INTERVENTION

The book includes a selection of papers concerning some topics investigated by psychologists, which are relevant in the field of medical practice. They have been collected so to allow readers to realise to what extent psychology can provide contributions to improve the way physicians interact with their patients and manage their mental resources in order to enhance their reasoning and decision-making processes and to control emotional reactions. The topics addressed are: the reduction of the patients' tendency to prosecute physicians because of alleged medical errors, a tendency which feeds defensive medicine; the reluctance to donate body organs after death; the way physicians face ambiguity and uncertainty so to mitigate the stress they perceive; the management of different mental systems (intuition, analytical thinking, and fast-and-frugal heuristics) in medical decision making.