Research Initiation:Exploring the Role of Story-Driven Learning to Foster Empathy in the Professional Formation of Engineers

工程师解决具有挑战性的问题，以帮助他人和更好的社会。为了设计有效的解决方案，工程师不仅要在设计过程中运用同理心，还要在解决问题的合作方法中运用同理心。培养工程专业学生的同理心对于延续技术卓越和服务社会的传统至关重要，这是过去工程师专业形成的特征。虽然很难在财务上量化，但同理心是一种超越负责任的产品设计或创新的经济必需品。领导力、合同谈判、解决工作场所冲突，甚至成功地营销产品，都需要通过他人的眼睛来观察和体验世界。今天的工科学生将被要求解决一些世界上最棘手的问题。他们需要具备深厚的技术专业知识，还需要具备同理心，以设计解决方案，并促进与他人的真正接触。培养具有同理心的工程师不仅会改善工程专业，还会改善整个社会。在工程领域内对移情的认可和促进将增加更广泛的受众将工程视为相关的、包容的和有影响力的职业的可能性。提高同理心作为一项重要的工程技能的意识，将有助于一个更全面的工程专业，吸引和留住更多样化的学生群体。本项目旨在促进对工程教育中移情发展的理解，并促进教学方法的进一步发展，以培养作为工程师专业形成的一部分急需的移情。为此，本研究将探讨佐治亚理工学院生物医学工程（BME）课程中用于培养同理心的学习活动。乔治亚理工学院的BME系在核心课程中利用了各种各样的学习活动。本项目将以该系为研究背景，以多维共情模型为理论框架，采用探索性的嵌入式案例研究方法来探索(1)乔治亚理工学院教师在BME课程中使用哪些学习活动来培养共情，以及原因；(2)学生如何体验这些学习活动；(3)与通过故事驱动学习形成的共情成分相比，这些学习活动对共情多维结构的哪些成分影响最大。该项目将依靠调查抽样、学生作业分析和学生访谈作为多种证据来源的方法。所有调查方法的数据将用于得出结论，并在我们的案例研究中比较和对比所有这些学习活动中的学习活动、教师意图、学生体验和移情发展。本研究通过观察在本科工程课程中各种学习活动对共情发展的影响，将促进对共情发展作为一个多维结构在工程教育中的整体理解。该项目还将促进以研究为基础的教学法的进一步发展，这些教学法已被证明可以培养同理心。最后，本研究将为更好地理解教学方法对共情发展的不同影响奠定基础，并为未来的工作提供信息，以理解故事驱动学习作为一种创新方法对共情发展的作用，作为工程师专业形成的一部分。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Engineers solve challenging problems to help other people and better society. In order to design effective solutions engineers must employ empathy not only in their design process but also in their collaborative approach to problems. Fostering empathy in engineering students is critical for the continuing tradition of technical excellence and service to society that has characterized the professional formation of engineers in the past. Although difficult to quantify financially, empathy is an economic necessity that goes beyond responsible product design or innovation. Leadership, negotiating contracts, resolving workplace conflicts, and even marketing products successfully require seeing and experiencing the world through the eyes of others. Today’s engineering students will be asked to solve some of the world’s toughest problems. They will need to be equipped with deep technical expertise but also an empathic mindset to design solutions and facilitate authentic engagement with others. Preparing engineers equipped with an empathic mindset will result in the betterment of not only the engineering profession but society as a whole. The recognition and promotion of empathy within engineering will increase the likelihood that broader audiences will perceive engineering as a relevant, inclusive, and impactful profession. Raising awareness of empathy as an important engineering skill will contribute to a more holistic engineering profession that will attract and retain a more diverse group of students. This project seeks to advance the understanding of the development of empathy in engineering education and contribute to the further development of teaching methods proven to foster much needed empathy as part of the professional formation of engineers. Toward this end, the proposed work will explore the landscape of learning activities used to develop empathy within the Biomedical Engineering (BME) curriculum at the Georgia Institute of Technology. The BME department at Georgia Tech makes use of a wide variety of diverse learning activities within the core curriculum. Using this department as the context of our study and a multi-dimensional model of empathy as our theoretical framework, this project will employ an exploratory, embedded case study approach to explore (1) what learning activities faculty are using to foster empathy in BME courses at Georgia Tech and why, (2) how students are experiencing these learning activities, and (3) what components of empathy as a multidimensional construct are most influenced through these learning activities as compared to those components of empathy developed through story-driven learning. The project will rely on the methods of survey sampling, analysis of student work, and student interviews as multiple sources of evidence. The data from all methods of inquiry will be used to draw conclusions and compare and contrast the learning activities, faculty intentions, student experiences, and empathy development across all of these learning activities within our case study. By looking at the impact of a wide variety of learning activities on the development of empathy over the course of an undergraduate engineering program, this study will advance the understanding of the development of empathy as a multi-dimensional construct in engineering education as a whole. The project will also contribute to the further development of research-based pedagogies proven to foster empathy. Finally, this work will serve as a foundation that will provide a better understanding of the differential impact of pedagogical approaches on the development of empathy as well as inform future work towards understanding the role of story-driven learning as an innovative approach for the development of empathy as part of the professional formation of engineers.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.