Metaphors in the mirror: The influence of teaching metaphors in a medical education programme

Abstract

Medical students often face problems in using and understanding metaphors when communicating with a patient or reading a scientific paper. These figures of speech constitute an interpretative problem and students need key strategies to facilitate metaphor comprehension and disambiguation of meaning. This article examines how medical students’ strategies of metaphor comprehension could be improved by specific teaching on metaphors using a Cognitive Linguistics approach. Medical students’ ability to comprehend mirror neuron metaphors was assessed comparing the performance of students who did not receive any instruction about metaphoric extension strategies after a lesson on mirror neurons with the performance of students who received a special lesson both on mirror neurons and on metaphoric extension strategies. Students who received specific teaching on metaphor comprehension strategies performed better (85 %) and were more likely to use analogical reasoning and contextual clues than those who did not receive any specific teaching (55 %), who tended to adopt a violation strategy. Thus, their ability to give an exhaustive reinterpretation of metaphors seems to be affected by their ability to manage metaphoric extension strategies. These findings suggest that introducing a Cognitive Linguistics approach and using metaphoric extension strategies to aid metaphor comprehension may be an active and productive teaching strategy in a medical education programme.

Peer creation and sharing of mnemonics in collaborative documents for pathology education: a pilot study

“…These statements make it clear that whenever a new technology is used, educators and students should know why they are using the technique and why it is appropriate to use it in that particular context [ 30 ]. Another study found that students who received specific instruction in metaphor comprehension strategies performed better than those who did not receive specific instruction and who even tended to adopt a violation strategy [ 31 ]. We were able to observe something similar with our students, especially since visual similarities of specimen outlines were the most popular mnemonic aid.…”

Didactic potential of metaphors used in medical discourse

“…being fluent in using and recognising metaphors can be taught, and this is also supported by Bobrova & Lantolf (2012). Canziani (2016) proves that introducing cognitive linguistics approach to metaphor leads to more productive teaching in medical education. Skorczynska (2013) provides an overview of metaphors used in educational contexts, focusing mainly on oral interaction, lectures and presentations.…”