Social-Psychological Differences between Men and Women Greek Doctors

1. Social-Psychological Differences between Men and Women Greek Doctors Hatzoglou, C., Gourgoulianis, K.I., Pappas, P., Kotrotsiou, E. & Gouva M. Medical School - Postgraduate Program “Primary Care Health”, University of Thessaly – Greece The 52% of the sample (73,3% of male and 33,5% of female) are single with mean age 33,9 and 34,2 correspondingly. Statistically significant differences were found between the two sexes in the age of marriage. Men are married at a significantly higher age compared to women. In their comparison using the T-Test it was observed that the male resident doctors showed a statistically higher mean value in the subscales of: behavioral shame (Ρ=0,045), criticism of others (Ρ=0,031), extrapunitiveness (Ρ=0,048). Women residents were shown to have a statistically higher mean value in the whereas in Anxiety scale, Neurotism and lying tendency whereas in the other scales, there were not demonstrated statistically significant results. Introduction Results . Many studies have concluded that doctors –irrelevant of their specialties- have higher levels of hostility and psychological problems compared to these observed in the general population. Furthermore, the continuously increased number of women studying medicine has significantly changed the demographic constitution of the medical profession. Combining the demanding working needs and stressing family obligations, female doctors find themselves pulled in two different directions. Aim The investigation of psychological characteristics of Greek male and female resident doctors and possible differences between the two groups. 102 Greek resident doctors in the field of Internal Medicine, 45 male and 57 female, participated in the present study. The measuring tools used were: a) the Other As Shamer Scale (OAS), b) the Experience of Shame Scale (ESS), c) the Hostility and Direction of Hostility Questionnaire (HDHQ), d) The Symptom Checklist-90-R (SCL-90-R), e) a questionnaire concerning socio-demographic information. Materials and Methods Table 1: Differences psychometric scales between GP’s and Internists. There were demonstrated some differences between the two sexes. There were not demonstrated significant differences between male and female doctors regarding the level of their hostility. Both sexes in the sample showed high levels of hostility, a result that is supported by many other international studies. Concerning the socio-demographic results of the study it must be stressed that the medical doctors used in the sample are married at a higher age compared to the general Greek population. Taking into consideration that the percentage of the single women born in 1970 in the general Greek population is 22%, we can deduce that the percentage of single female doctors is higher that that of the General female population of their coevals. Furthermore, it was demonstrated that male doctors marry at a significantly higher age. Conclusion • Gupta, R., Vohra, AK.,  Gupta, A.,  Singla, SL. (2002). A study of hostility, career choice and job satisfaction among surgeons Medical Journal Armed Forces India, 58(3), 210-213. • Finset, KB., Gude, T., Hem, E., Tyssen, R., Oivind Ekeberg, O. & Vaglum, P. (2005). Which young physicians are satisfied with their work? A prospective nationwide study in Norway, BMC Med Educ, 5:19. References