review (2008) suggest that professional mentors and role models have a strong influence on the development of professional nurses and that committed, ethical, and empathetic service on the part of those mentors and role models is associated directly with the development of similar approaches on the part of new nurses. That review also indicated that mentors and role models play an important role in helping new nurses form realistic career expectations that minimize dissatisfaction, disillusionment, and diminution of empathy in clinical settings (Murphy, Jones, Edwards, et al., 2008).

The implications of the Price study (2009) suggest that while individuals who choose nursing as a career do exhibit higher levels of empathy and caring as a group than the general population, those qualities are more likely to diminish through the entire course of professional nursing training. This result runs counterintuitive to expectations that professional nursing training would foster those predispositions and...
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