[43] While a number of pharmacists

expressed negative personal attitudes towards CPD, the majority of the research participants within the various studies seemed beset by the compound interaction of barriers apparently outside of their control, such as time and resource issues. A number of theories have been developed to examine the process by which people attribute behaviour (including their own) to internal or external causes and there is now a large body of Cyclopamine mouse evidence showing that people’s judgements about the causes of behaviour are not completely rational but biased.[44] A common observation is that people attribute successes internally, as within their control, whereas failures are attributed externally to others or to the circumstances, Fulvestrant ic50 a concept captured by the term ‘self-serving attribution bias’.[44] A self-serving bias is therefore said to exist where an individual’s assignment of responsibility affects his or her beliefs in an optimistic way, a way that

makes things appear better than they are from the individual’s point of view. We believe there may be an element of self-serving attribution bias at play in terms of pharmacy professionals’ stated barriers to CPD. That is, pharmacy professionals’ own explanations for lack of participation in CPD could stem from their erroneous perception that it is mainly factors external to their control that pose the real barriers, and that ultimately external factors are helping to drive participation in CPD. This would indicate that making CPD a statutory requirement could compel pharmacy professionals to engage with the process at some level, and indeed the personal correspondence referred to above seems to indicate the same. Nonetheless, if CPD is to Cyclin-dependent kinase 3 be truly successful and useful for revalidation, it seems that people’s beliefs and attitudes must be addressed through the modification

of the various other external barriers perceived to be impacting on CPD behaviour. The implications of the current findings can be considered as follows. If CPD is to succeed and be useful as part of revalidation, pharmacy professionals’ beliefs and attitudes must be addressed by recognising and modifying barriers through a combination of four main categories of regulatory, professional, work-related and personal channels (see Figure 2). We believe it is possible to draw on the current findings to suggest a number of remedial steps in relation to these categories so as to ultimately impact on pharmacy professionals’ personal motivations and therefore participation in CPD.