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Embracing the tension between vulnerability and credibility: 'intellectual candour' in health professions education

journal contribution
posted on 2019-01-01, 00:00 authored by Elizabeth Molloy, Margaret BearmanMargaret Bearman
The tension between expressing vulnerability and seeking credibility creates challenges for learning and teaching. This is particularly true in health care, in which practitioners are regarded as highly credible and making errors can often lead to dire consequences and blame. From a transformative learning perspective, expressing vulnerability may help individuals to access different ways of knowing. By contrast, from a sociological perspective, seeking to maintain credibility results in ritualised interactions and these ritualised encounters can reinforce credibility. One means of embracing this tension between expressing vulnerability and appearing credible is 'intellectual candour', an improvisational expression of doubts, thoughts and problems with the dual purpose of learning and promoting others' learning. Educators' revelations of inner struggles are proposed as a means of inviting reciprocal vulnerability. This builds trust and a platform for learning, particularly of the transformative nature. It also allows modelling of how to balance the vulnerability-credibility tension, which may provide a template for professional practice.

History

Journal

Medical education

Volume

53

Issue

1

Pagination

32 - 41

Publisher

John Wiley & Sons

Location

Chichester, Eng.

eISSN

1365-2923

Language

eng

Publication classification

C1 Refereed article in a scholarly journal

Copyright notice

2018, John Wiley & Sons Ltd and The Association for the Study of Medical Education