The Impact of Medical Profession Type, Gender, and Years of Experience on Thinking Styles: What Are the Implications for Patient Safety?

Background: Healthcare providers were faced daily with many decision-making that impacted patients’ safety. According to dual process theory, there were two types of thinking: Experiential style (ES) and Rational Style (RS). Both thinking styles had an impact on individuals’ decisions making. Therefore, the aim of this study was to find out nurses’ and physicians’ styles of thinking and how this impacted patients’ safety. Design: A cross-sectional study. Me-thods: Nurses and physicians sample of adults (n = 308), 190 (61.7%) of the sample were nurses and 118 (38.3%) of the sample were physicians. Participants completed a self-report online survey, which included demographic information followed by questionnaires to measure thinking style and a cognitive puzzle to see if the medical error was associated with certain styles of thinking. Results: The main findings were that nurses (M = 2.41, SD = 0.37) had significantly higher scores compared to physicians (M = 2.29, SD = 0.39) in their ES, t(305) = 2.73, p = 0.007; with medium effect size, d = 0.37692. Conclusion: Nurses differed from physicians in ES where nurses had a significantly higher score than physicians which could be positive for patients’ safety as higher ES would report errors compared to lower ES.