Research Initiation: Development and Initial Validation of an Engineering Empathy Scale

工程师需要解决的问题是复杂的，不仅仅是从智力上严谨的角度来看，而且还必须考虑解决方案中必须考虑的无数社会，道德和人类因素。为此，同理心是工程师理解这些复杂问题并提供满足社会需求的解决方案所需的基本技能。然而，共情在主流工程文化中被贬低，在很大程度上不包括在大学工程形成中。为了纠正工程形成中的这一差距，更多的研究人员必须研究工程中的同理心，并为工程师创造与同理心培训相关的干预措施和工具。为了能够评估和装备一个更有同理心的工程师，与工程相关和特定的同理心能力必须是可测量的。本项目的目的是创建一个工程移情量表（EES），以衡量职业生涯前的工程师，执业工程师和工程教育工作者的移情。通过使用工程特定的移情场景，EES将克服当前工程形成中的一个问题，即移情知识与其在工程学科中的作用之间的脱节。通过了解同理心在工程中的作用，工程师将能够更好地了解其工作的背景、价值观和驱动力，并与那些受其工作影响的人建立联系和沟通。这些特点将使工程师能够更好地为社会服务。该项目还将把PI引入工程教育领域，并增加研究工程移情的研究人员数量。 目前，很少有研究描述在工程实践和教育中的移情显示器的场景，并没有量化的规模存在，以评估工程师的移情能力，在工程的具体情况。EES的发展将由两个关键的研究问题驱动：共情是如何在概念上感知，体验，并显示在工程的具体情况？工程专业的具体情况可以用来衡量工程专业的学生，教师和从业人员的同理心吗？EES发展的理论指导来自移情的三个结构：认知，情感和行为，以及工程移情模型。使用这个框架，研究小组将与实践工程师和工程教育工作者进行半结构化的焦点小组，以获得移情思想，情感的详细描述，并在工程实践和教育活动的特定背景下显示。焦点小组的叙述将被分析，以产生工程移情的总体主题。由此产生的主题将用于开发一系列关于工程特定场景中的同理心的问题。该初始问题集将经过专家和新手审查，小组成员之间的编码协议将用于选择用于初始验证的问题集。将通过对工程专业学生对EES的反应进行验证性因素分析，确定EES的初始验证和可靠性。这一提议的完成将导致量化评估工具EES的公开发布，以便工程教育工作者和雇用工程师的公司可以使用该工具来反映和指示同理心培训的有效性。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并被认为值得通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估来支持。

The problems engineers are called to solve are complex, not just from an intellectually rigorous perspective, but also from the myriad of societal, ethical, and human elements that must be considered in the solution. To this end, empathy is an essential skill needed by engineers to understand these complex problems and provide solutions that meet the needs of society. Empathy, however, is devalued within dominant engineering culture and largely not included in collegiate engineering formation. To correct this gap in engineering formation, more researchers must study empathy in engineering and create interventions and tools related to empathy training for engineers. To be able to assess and equip a more empathetic engineer, empathetic capabilities relevant and specific to engineering must be measurable. The aim of this project is to create an Engineering Empath Scale (EES) to measure empathy in pre-career engineers, practicing engineers, and engineering educators. Through the use of engineering specific empathetic scenarios, the EES will overcome a current issue in engineering formation, a disconnect between knowledge of empathy generally and its role within the discipline of engineering. Through knowledge of the role of empathy within engineering, engineers will be better able to understand the context, values, and driving forces of their work and relate to and communicate with those impacted by their work. These traits will allow engineers to better holistically serve society. This project will also introduce the PI to the field of engineering education and increase the number of researchers studying empathy in engineering. Currently, few studies describe scenarios of empathetic displays within engineering practice and education and no quantitative scale exists to assess an engineer’s empathetic abilities in engineering specific scenarios. The development of the EES will be driven by two key research questions: How is empathy conceptually perceived, experienced, and shown in engineering specific situations? and Can engineering specific situations be used to measure empathy in engineering students, faculty, and practitioners? Theoretical guidance for development of the EES comes from the three constructs of empathy: cognitive, affective, and behavioral, and a model for empathy in engineering. Using this framework, the research team will conduct semi-structured focus groups with practicing engineers and engineering educators to obtain detailed descriptions of empathetic thoughts, emotions, and displays within the specific context of engineering practice and education activities. Focus group narratives will be analyzed to produce overarching themes of empathy in engineering. The themes that result will be used to develop a large set of questions regarding empathy in engineering specific scenarios. This initial question set will go through expert and novice review and coding agreement between panel members will be used to select the question set for initial validation. Initial validation and reliability of the EES will be determined through confirmatory factor analysis of engineering students’ responses to the EES. Accomplishment of this proposal will result in a quantitative assessment tool, the EES, to be made publicly available so that engineering educators, and companies that employee engineers, can use the tool for reflection and indication of empathy training effectiveness.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.