Being seen by others as we see ourselves: the congruence between the ingroup and outgroup perceptions of health and social care students

This paper examines inter-group processes amongst neophyte health and social care students about to embark on an inter-professional educational programme. Positive relationships between students of the different professions must be optimised to promote student learning of each other, a central objective of these courses. It has been proposed that to reduce conflict and promote harmonious inter-group relations during this IPE activity, students from each professional group should feel their own group (the in-group) to be distinctive from other professional groups (the out-group) on some key characteristics (intergroup differentiation). Good relations are further promoted if the characteristics they see as distinctive to their identities are also recognised as distinctive by other professional groups (mutual inter-group differentiation). The current paper considers the incidence of these two factors in neophyte health and social care students and identifies sources of potential inter-group conflict. The findings of the study suggest that all groups of neophyte health and social care students perceived their in-group as distinct from other professional groups with the exception of audiology students. The implications of this finding to the relationships between students participating in IPE are discussed. Further, in certain groups, there was evidence that students of these groups were seen by others as they saw themselves. This was particularly the case for doctors and social workers and implies these professions will suffer least from a threat to their group distinctiveness. However, there were instances where characteristics, seen as distinctive by the professional group itself, were not recognised by other groups. For example, physiotherapy students believe that being a team player, decision making and practical skills were all distinctive characteristics of their profession. However, these features were not recognised as distinctive by other professional groups. The implications of matches/mismatches in how students see themselves and how they may be viewed by others are discussed in terms of their impact on student learning experiences and relationships during inter-professional education.