The relationship between moral conduct and moral judgment was investigated by comparing moral reasoning of a psychopathic sample from a maximum security hospital for the criminal offender with a similar inmate, nonpsychopathic sample, and a group of “normals”. Psychopaths obtained significantly higher scores on the Kohlberg scale of moral judgment than either of the other groups, for whom no differences were found. Results suggest the hypothesis that lack of guilt feelings in psychopaths facilitate the achievement of higher levels of moral judgment.

Does the ability of medical students to assess and relate to their patients through the psychiatric interview reflect in traditional academic achievement scores? A previous publication by our group offers data suggesting that certain personality traits of final year medical students have a fundamental importance in determining a successful performance on a psychiatry rotation. As the literature is vague and contradictory about the relation-ship between the psychiatric interview and clinical performance, a study was developed to determine what outcome variables are associated with the performance of clinical clerks on the Psychiatric Interview’ An attempt was made to develop and test a new scale designed to measure the Psychiatric Interview. The Psychiatric Interview Scale was used to measure performance on 33 final year medical students on a 1 month psychiatry rotation at a University of Toronto teaching hospital, and subsequently, as a basis for analysis and training of these students in interviewing. Inter-rater reliability of the Psychiatric Interview Scale was rho = 0.72 and internal reliability was 0.74. Psychiatric Interview Scores were compared with other achievement scores, and with patients’ ratings of the students interviews. A significant correlation emerged between the Psychiatric interview scores and final clinical examinations, but surprisingly, there was no relationship between the patients’ evaluation of the Psychiatric Interview and the raters’ evaluations and a strongly significant negative correlation between patients’ ratings and clinical scores. The importance of observed psychiatric interviews in teaching and evaluation are discussed along with the interesting implications of the differing evaluations of a successful interview by patients and psychiatrists. The relevance of training in the Psychiatric Interview to general medicine and family practice is emphasized.

An attempt was made in this study to develop a composite profile of personality characteristics of medical students that correlated differentially with successful achievement outcomes in the Psychiatry CLerkship at a University of Toronto teaching hospital. Data on 27 of 33 final year medical students in a psychiatry rotation programme were used to analyse canonical correlations between personality and achievement variables. The findings of the study indicated that success in clinical examinations was significantly correlated (R = 0.64, P less than 0.001) with a personality defined as apprehensive, anxious and less neurotic. Success on oral examinations was significantly correlated (R = 0.37, P less than 0.01) with a personality defined as anxious, more neurotic and extroverted. Success in objective multiple choice tests was not significantly correlated (R = 0.21, P = 0.10) with any particular personality profile, but the direction of the correlations suggested a personality describable as less intelligent (concrete thinking), apprehensive, adjusted and introverted. Although the small sample makes conclusions tentative, the findings are that students' personality differentially affect their examination results.

The Association for Medical Education in Europe (AMEE) is a worldwide association for all interested in medical and health professions education (http://www.amee.org). AMEE organizes an annual meeting, the most recent of which (2005) was held in Amsterdam. At this meeting certain countries and regions were better represented than others, while some countries with large populations or a significant role in the history of medical education were almost completely absent from the international scene. At the same time, the themes addressed at the AMEE conference concern issues of international interest, and appear to be leading to internationalization of pedagogical and research methods and policies for educational standards. It is therefore crucial that all parts of the medical education world be well represented. This paper illustrates both the strengths and imbalances of AMEE as a forum for the elaboration of international activities and standards in medical education. Finally, the authors wonder why a tendency to assume international generalizability of concepts and perspectives in medical education is not accompanied by studies that compare and contrast medical education methods, research and values between countries and cultures.

An innovative program, introduced into a tradition-based undergraduate medical school curriculum, was evaluated using an ethnographic approach for data collection and analysis. The objective of theevaluation study was to provide data in support of rational decision making with respect to the future of the innovation. This article describes the methodology andprocesses used to evaluate the innovation and assesses the strengths and weaknesses of the evaluation.