The confidence that you ’ ll succeed if you try …

Self efficacy. It’s a word bandied about a lot in pain management, and for a group of clinicians in NZ, it’s been a shock to find out that – oh no! They’re not supporting self efficacy with their patients very much! It means “confidence that if I do this under these conditions, I’ll be successful”. Self efficacy is part of Bandura’s social learning theory (click here for the Wikipedia entry) where he proposed that much of psychological treatment is driven by a common underlying mechanism: to create and strengthen expectations of personal effectiveness. Bandura recognised that we don’t always have to personally experiment through trial and error in order to learn. Self efficacy expectations were thought to develop from personal experience (let me do, and I’ll learn how); watching other people try (show me, and I’ll see if you succeed, then I’ll copy you); verbal persuasion that aims to convince that you have the capabilities to manage successfully (encourage me, let me know I can, and I’ll try); and how physiologically aroused or alert you are (if I feel confident inside, I’ll try but if I feel anxious or stressed I’m less inclined to) (Bandura, 1977). Bandura and colleagues established that “different treatment approaches alter expectations of personal efficacy, and the more dependable the source of efficacy information, the greater are the changes in self-efficacy.” (Bandura...
Source: HealthSkills Weblog - Category: Anesthesiology Authors: Tags: Clinical reasoning Coping Skills Coping strategies Motivation Pain Pain conditions Professional topics Research Resilience Science in practice biopsychosocial Chronic pain function healthcare pain management rehabilitation Source Type: blogs