Reflect to interact - fostering medical students' communication through reflection-focused e-learning

Area of Science:

• Medical Education
• Communication Skills
• E-learning

Background:

• Reflection is crucial for developing medical communication competence.
• Optimal methods for integrating reflection into online medical education are not well-established.
• This research aimed to explore effective ways to promote and embed reflection in e-learning for physician-patient communication.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate how reflection processes can be promoted and embedded in an e-learning course.
• To foster learning in physician-patient communication through structured reflection.
• To compare the effectiveness of different e-learning designs on student reflection levels.

Main Methods:

• 114 first-year medical students participated in one of three e-learning conditions: video modeling (VM), video reflection (VR), or a combined approach (VMR).
• Students completed nine reflections based on guiding questions at three course intervals.
• Reflection levels were assessed using an adapted REFLECT rubric (scale 0-18).

Main Results:

• All course variants facilitated reflection beyond a descriptive level, with no significant differences in overall scores between VM, VR, and VMR.
• Students in the VM group showed significant improvement in reflection levels throughout the course.
• Reflection scores positively correlated with text length, indicating deeper engagement.

Conclusions:

• The study presents a viable teaching strategy for fostering high-quality reflection in online medical education.
• Developed reflection prompts are easily adaptable to various e-learning platforms.
• This approach supports effective reflection even with limited instructional time.