Lack of conscientiousness (134 incidences) was seen by the students to involve all to some degree: physician/teaching faculty (45%), nurses (30%), students (17%) and administrative staff/other (7%).
Habitual drug use and different personality traits, such as neuroticism and lack of conscientiousness, are risk factors for contracting and spreading HIV.
Cultural or religious insensitivity (85 incidences) involved both students (49%) and physician/teaching faculty (42%), while lack of conscientiousness (61 incidences) involved largely faculty (57%) and students (36%).
The report also describes seven issues that "challenge or diminish the previously identified elements of professionalism"; these include: abuse of power, arrogance, greed, misrepresentation, impairment, lack of conscientiousness, and conflict of interest (acceptance of gifts, collaboration with industry).
These include: arrogance, impairment, breach of confidentiality, lack of conscientiousness, abusing power asymmetries, misrepresentation, bias and sexual harassment, collaboration with industry, acceptance of gifts, and compromising ethical principles, to which was added cultural or religious insensitivity.
At the clerkship level, the six most frequent categories of lapses of professionalism were the same but the rank order of the type of incidences changed: arrogance (55.3%), breach of confidentiality (28.7%), cultural or religious insensitivity (26.6%), impairment (25.5%), and lack of conscientiousness (23.4%); abusing power asymmetries was slightly less (22.3%).
A negative response to items 41,42, 43 and to a lesser extent 36 would have required an admission of lack of ability (conscientiousness, competence, flexibility and organisational ability); this could explain why there were no negative responses for these items and the skewed response distribution reduced the usefulness these items.
Conscientiousness is also a good predictor of job performance [ 17, 18] and this may be of particular importance in the medical profession where as previously mentioned a lack of conscientious behaviour has been associated with unprofessional behaviour in clinical practice [ 13].
It measured people's personality under traits including "agreeableness verses antagonism", "conscientiousness versus lack of direction", "neuroticism versus emotional stability", and "extroversion verses introversion".
And with this conscientiousness and lack of self-importance came another quality, a keen ability to empathise with others and fight their corner when she believed they were being wronged.
Conscientiousness vs. lack of direction: The degree to which a person is willing to comply with conventional rules and norms.
