Does relationship between agreeableness and empathy vary considering other personality factors?: An empirical study

Pages 826-831
Asmita Karmakar (Department of Psychology, University of Calcutta, Kolkata)
Pallabi Chatterjee (Department of Psychology, IGNOU, New Delhi)
Atanu Kumar Dogra (Department of Psychology, University of Calcutta, Kolkata)

Empathy refers to the capacity to feel and/or share others’ emotions and is a necessary element of physician-patient relationship. Personality factors altogether reflect individual differences in social, emotional and behavioural patterns. This study aimed to assess the relationship if any, between different domains of empathy and factors of personality (Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Openness to experience, Extraversion & Neuroticism). Study sample comprised of 200 undergraduate medical students of 19 to 22 years of age. At first, data of all factors of personality were split based on median. Then four types of combination were formulated based on agreeableness and rest of the factors of personality individually. Comparison of the data of all dimensions of empathy among these four groups were done by computing ANOVA and post hoc Tukey test. Results are discussed and limitations are pointed out.