ATTITUDE TOWARDS COMMUNICATION SKILLS LEARNING AMONG UNDERGRADUATE PHYSICAL THERAPY STUDENTS: A CROSS-SECTIONAL STUDY

Abstract

Background: The development of communication skills is one of the essential professional skills in the physical therapy field, which directly affects patient safety, satisfaction, decision-making and compliance with the rehabilitation program. Irrespective of their significance, student attitudes toward learning communication skills may influence engagement and acquisition of skills. Objective: To establish the perception of the undergraduate physical therapy students on the communication skills learning. Methods: The study was a descriptive cross-sectional study which was carried out on undergraduate Doctor of Physical Therapy (DPT) students attending selected rehabilitation institutes located in Karachi, Pakistan. The non-probability convenience sampling was used to recruit 140 students between third and fifth year in academics. Communication skills attitude scale (CSAS) (Positive Attitude Scale, PAS, and Negative Attitude Scale, NAS) was used to measure attitudes towards communication skills learning. The SPSS version 21.0 was used to analyze the data. The descriptive statistics was presented in frequencies and percentages. Results: 87.9 percent of the total participants (140) were female. The general data on the attitudes towards learning communication skills showed that 73.6% of students were positively oriented towards communication skills, 24.3% were negatively oriented, and 2.1% demonstrated the neutrality in their attitude. The higher PAS scores than the NAS scores reflected a good level of recognizing the significance of communication skills in clinical practice and low level of resistance to learning communication skills, respectively. Conclusion: The physical therapy undergraduates were found to have mostly positive attitudes regarding the acquisition of communication skills. These results justify the systematic and longitudinal incorporation of communication skills education and measurement into the undergraduate physical therapy courses in order to improve the professional competence, as well as patient-centered rehabilitation outcomes.

Keywords: Attitude; communication skills; learning; physical therapy students; CSAS