The Relationship between Medical Students’ Personality Traits and Their Favorite Residency Specialty

Abtahi, Saeed; Mostafavian, Zahra; Salehian, Razieh; Ahmadnia, Mobina

doi:10.22118/edc.2020.248203.1527

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

¹ Department of Pediatric Cardiology, Medical School, Islamic Azad University,Mashhad, Iran

² Faculty member, Department of Community Medicine, Mashhad Medical Sciences Branch, Islamic Azad University, Mashhad, Iran.

³ Faculty member, Rasoul-e-Akram Hospital, Iran University of Medical Sciences (IUMS), Tehran, Iran.

⁴ Medical student, Department of Community Medicine, Medical School, Islamic Azad University, Mashhad, Iran.

https://doi.org/10.22118/edc.2020.248203.1527

Abstract

Pursuing their education in residency specialties is one of the options that medical graduates have in their academic trajectory. The choice of these specialties determines the future of physicians’ career and even their life, and this is one of the most challenging decisions for physicians to make in their life. Therefore, the aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between medical students’ personality traits and their favorite residency specialty. This cross-sectional study was performed on medical students studying at their externship and internship programs at Islamic Azad University of Mashhad in the second semester of the academic year 2019-2020. Data collection tools were Persian Questionnaire of Personality Traits FFI -NEO (Neuroticism-Extraversion-Openness Five Facto Inventor), socio-economic status questionnaire, and demographic information checklist including age, gender, marital status, educational level and preferred medical specialty. Data were analyzed in SPSS v.20 software using analysis of variance, chi-square, and regression tests. In this study, 151 medical students were studied. The most common fields of interest were dermatology/cardiology (15.9%), ophthalmology (11.9%) and radiology (10.6%). No relationship was found between personality traits and students' choice of specialty. In the regression analysis, only gender had a statistically significant relationship with the favorite medical specialty. That is, 51.3% of the men chose the fields of surgery and 65.2% of women chose the fields of specialized group. (P = 0.013) According to the results of this study, different personality traits are not very effective in choosing the medical specialty of medical students.

Keywords

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Educational Development of Judishapur

The Relationship between Medical Students’ Personality Traits and Their Favorite Residency Specialty

References

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Volume 12, Issue 2
Quarterly Journal of Summer 2021
October 2021
Pages 485-498

The Relationship between Medical Students’ Personality Traits and Their Favorite Residency Specialty

References

References

Borges, NJ, Osman, WR. (2001). Personality and medical specialty choice: technique orientation versus people orientation. Journal of Vocational Behavior, Vol.58, Issue 1, Pp. 22-35

Volume 12, Issue 2Quarterly Journal of Summer 2021October 2021Pages 485-498

Volume 12, Issue 2
Quarterly Journal of Summer 2021
October 2021
Pages 485-498