(Medical Xpress) -- Medical education that focuses on attitude-based learning may increase interest in geriatric health careers, according to a new study from researchers at Rice University, the University of Pittsburgh and the University of California  San Diego.

With Americas senior population expected to double between 2005 and 2030, the number of geriatric health practitioners is insufficient to meet the projected health needs of the countrys burgeoning senior population, said Vikas Mittal, study co-author and the J. Hugh Liedtke Professor of Marketing at Rice. We must do everything possible to find ways to meet the growing demand for careers in geriatric healthcare.

The paper, Late-life Mental Health Education for Workforce Development: Brain vs. Heart? revealed that affective learning, a type of learning that shapes attitudes, emotions and values, is most useful in improving medical students feelings towards careers in geriatric healthcare.

The study included 42 students in medical school and graduate programs of nursing, social work and clinical psychology. Participants viewed four web-based interactive video documentaries on mental health and aging at one-week intervals in random order on the Internet. The lessons, chosen from a curriculum of 13 courses developed by Fox Learning Systems out of Pittsburgh, Penn., were Successful Aging, Complicated Grief, Minority Elders and Mental Health, and Suicide in Late-life. Participants were surveyed online prior to the first lesson and again four weeks later, following the final lesson.

Telling the real-life stories of actual people through digital media is a powerful educational tool, said Jules Rosen, director of the University of Pittsburgh, Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic. Blending instructive presentations of academic experts with the video-documentaries of patients and their families enhances both cognitive and affective learning.

The findings revealed significant improvements in both the cognitive and affective knowledge domains. Only change in affective learning was associated with an increase in considering a geriatric career in the future.

A widely accepted truism of marketing is that repetition of both message and interactions are critical for changing customers attitudes and behaviors, Mittal said. As geriatric mental health educators, our goal should include further development of a well-trained workforce in addition to imparting clinical knowledge.

The study was co-authored by University of Pittsburgh professors Jules Rosen, Emily Stiehl, Charles Reynolds and John Hennon, Fox Leaning Systems, Inc. Founder and CEO Debra Fox, and University of California  San Diego professor Dilip Jeste. It will appear in an upcoming edition of The American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry.

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More information: The research was funded by grants from the National Institute of Health and the Hartford Centers of Excellence in Geriatric Psychiatry in Pittsburgh and San Diego.