Emotion recognition by mental health professionals and students

Area of Science:

• Psychology
• Nursing Education
• Non-verbal Communication

Background:

• Accurate emotion identification is crucial for effective mental healthcare.
• Assessing non-verbal emotional cues is a key skill for mental health professionals.

Purpose of the Study:

• To compare emotion identification abilities between mental health professionals and nursing students.
• To evaluate the effectiveness of training on emotion recognition in nurses.

Main Methods:

• The Dynamic Emotion Recognition Instrument (DERI) was used to collect data.
• Non-parametric Mann-Whitney U tests were employed for data analysis.
• Ratio data were derived from DERI scores, representing proportions of correct responses.

Main Results:

• Mental health professionals outperformed London university nursing students in identifying emotions.
• No significant difference was found between Omani nursing students and mental health professionals.
• Omani nursing students demonstrated superior emotion identification compared to London university students.
• Third-term Omani nursing students showed better emotion recognition than first-term students.

Conclusions:

• Nurse training can enhance the ability to interpret non-verbal emotional cues.
• The DERI is a valuable tool for assessing and developing emotion identification skills in nurses.
• The DERI can be utilized in pre and post-registration nursing education.