INSTRUMENTS FOR MEASURING THE PROFESSIONAL IDENTITY OF PSYCHOLOGICAL HELP PROVIDERS: RAPID LITERATURE REVIEW

The concept of professional identity is widely described, indicating that it is dynamic and variable, as it simultaneously includes the development and formation of professional identity in the dimensions of time and content. Professional identity manifests in various forms and it is measured by a variety of measurement tools. Objective: to define what measurement tools are used to determine the professional identity of psychological help providers and to investigate the content of professional identity. Method: a rapid literature review. A comprehensive search of scientific databases Access Medicine, Clinical Key, EBSCO e-books, Proquest Ebook Central, BMJ Journals, EBSCO host, ProQuest, SAGE journals, Wiley Online Library, Science Direct, DynaMed Plus and Cochrane Library was conducted in March, 2020 by two independent researchers therefore assuring data triangulation. Database research included the keywords “professional identity”, “scale”, “measure”, with the Boolean operator “AND” adding professions: “art therapist”, “dance and movement therapist”, “drama therapist”, “music therapist”, “psychologist”, “psychiatrist”, “psychotherapist”, “nurse”, “social worker”, and additional selection criteria - cross-sectional design studies about the measure of professional identity of different groups of psychological help providers and students, between 2009 and 2019, with full English text available. Data analysis method was narrative synthesis, which consists of three sequential steps: description of studies in logical categories, analysis of data from each of the derived categories, and synthesized conclusions for all included studies. 366 studies were identified of which 21 were included in the study. Results: as a result, 15 categories including 50 content items were identified as the measurement aspects of professional identity.