Table 8 Benefits of group reflections
From: A systematic scoping review of group reflection in medical education
Professional | |
Supporting professional formation of physicians | Improvement of self through sharing of reflections and receiving feedback  • Identify good practices and performance gaps [89, 106, 129, 132, 136,137,138,139,140,141,142].  • Create strategies to refine future performances through facilitated discussion [81, 89, 109, 136, 138, 143]  • Promotes expertise [115]  • Improve decision-making principles [109]  • Promotes self-efficacy [136]  • Increased job satisfaction |
Identity formation through exploration of emotions  • Linking the affective state to cognitive abilities [18]  • Fosters learning and helps participants reflect on both their personal and professional values and judgment [18, 89, 124, 136, 144, 145].  • Exploring strong emotional responses, be it positive or negative [61].  • Attitudes and perceptions developed through interaction with others [29]. | |
Provides a way of thinking and analysing practice [29, 122, 126, 129, 131, 137, 146]. | |
Increased competence, confidence or security in performing functions [24, 130] | |
Becoming more resilient [137] | |
Improved interpersonal and professional skills | Improved communication skills between healthcare professionals and with patients [20, 22, 24, 82, 109, 124, 136, 147].  • Realized importance of interprofessional teamwork  • Active listening  • Becoming systematically able to initiate dialogues with team members, leading to a collective basis for decision-making  • Helps to understand own and others behaviours and responses. |
Improved clinical reasoning and decision making [109, 129]  • Reflection on clinical situations or incidents to rationalize behaviour retrospectively  • Application of the reflective experiences into real-world experiences. | |
Development of soft skills | |
Patient-centred care [119]  • Become more aware of patient autonomy and respecting individuals  • Importance of trust in relationships | |
Improvement in patient outcomes [147]. | |
As a tool for learning enhancement | Sharing of reflections  • Understanding other perspectives and ideas [21, 29, 135, 136]  • Encourages providing honest feedback on skills and professional qualities due to a conducive environment [119]. |
Deeper understanding of skills  • Development of discussion skills, exploration, sharing and reflection upon experiences [28, 84, 114, 118,119,120, 124, 139].  • Allows learners to synthesize content and relate them to concepts [129, 132]. | |
As another avenue for students to engage in learning in addition to more traditional methods in classrooms  • Enhanced didactic learning [114] | |
Participants have gained a broader perspective, with the attitude change and seeing the value in different opinions or utilizing other’s perspectives [24, 29, 61, 82, 148]. | |
Participants experiences are improved and deepened [149]. | |
Team | Felt a sense of community and connectedness [61, 86, 100, 130, 135, 136]. |
Fosters meaningful relationships between participants [86].  • It builds morale among group members [24, 81, 89, 105, 124].  • Strengthens team cohesiveness [89] | |
Promotes peer support networks [138] | |
Strengthening shared mental models [122] | |
Feeling validated as they were not alone in experiencing these reactions [21, 82, 106, 137]. | |
Individual participants can react and build on other’s responses [29, 150] | |
Personal | |
Self-understanding | Recognition of personal growth and enhancement of professional values [86, 119, 135]. Increases self-awareness [18, 24, 60, 109, 114, 132, 137].  • Insights into strengths, weaknesses and learning needs [25, 89]  • Increased awareness of own assumptions about patient care [25, 134].  • Acknowledgement of vulnerabilities in an open, safe environment [18, 61]  • Questioning of personal beliefs and actions [109] |
Enhanced self-assessment | Identification of strengths and weaknesses  • Greater ease with receiving critical feedback from others [61, 136]  • Critical reflection of oneself, encouraging both cognitive and emotional self-awareness of beliefs, values and attitudes [25, 119]. |
Personal impact | |
Provide emotional support and helping to process responses  • Decreases stress and preventing burnout [18, 24, 81, 89, 137].  • Able to express emotions rather than keeping it in while reflecting alone [137, 151]. | |
Increased compassion and retention of empathy [18, 119, 130, 132, 137]. | |
Promotes hope [136] | |