From "boy" to "colleague": Processes of role transformation in professional socialization

Professional socialization is viewed as a two-directional process in which socializees are alternately pushed forward into professional roles and backward into their familiar student role. Systematic observation of four agents of socialization during early clinical training-physician-teachers, other hospital personnel, patients and peers-shows evidence of pressure on medical students in both directions. The research is carried out in Israel where a tradition of authoritarianism in education and the dual role of hospital physicians as teachers cum future employers, serve to emphasize students' dependency and lack of power. The strength of the relative push toward colleagual or student roles by physician socializers is shown to depend on the visibility and rigidity of the status hierarchy in the hospital as well as on the frequency of informal relations. Patients, who serve as audiences and reinforcers for experimental role performance, generally reflect attitudes of the physician socializers. The peer group of students plays a powerful role in social control, regulating the speed with which it is considered legitimate by socializees to take on the professional role.