Examining Impostor Phenomenon Through the Lens of Humility: Spotlighting Conceptual (Dis)Connections

Impostor phenomenon has gained increasing attention within the health care and health professions education literature. Although consistently depicted as a debilitating socioemotional experience, studies also suggest a strategic aspect to impostor phenomenon — denoting a conceptual ambiguity to impostor phenomenon that has yet to fully examined. Within this paper, we use humility as a conceptual sparring partner with impostor phenomenon to examine the similarities and differences between the concepts, as well as explore the various nuances associated with impostor phenomenon. By comparing and contrasting impostor phenomenon and humility from interdisciplinary perspectives and within the context of health professions specifically, we not only further refine their meaning and usage within the literature, but also spotlight key areas for future research.