Medical students' attitudes toward the anatomy dissection room in relation to personality

Abstract

Assessment of the personalities of medical students could enable medical educators to formulate strategies for the best development of academic and clinical competencies. In this article, we focus on the experience of students in the anatomy dissecting room. While there have been many attempts to evaluate the emotional responses of medical students to human cadaveric dissection, there has been no investigation into how different personality traits affect the responses. The main hypothesis tested was that there is a relationship between personality traits and attitudes toward the dissection room. For the present study, a group of French medical students (n = 403; mean age 21.3 ± 1.6; 65.3% female) completed a "Big Five" personality inventory and a questionnaire to assess their attitudes in regard to human dissection. The findings are consistent with our hypothesis, in that we found a relationship between reporting anxiety and four of the "Big Five" dimensions (all except openness). The rated level of anxiety was positively correlated with negative affectivity, more strongly at the beginning than at the end of the course. There were significant gender differences in attitudes toward dissection. The findings are discussed in relation to the possibility of preparing students for the dissecting room experience and also in relation to the students' understanding of mortality issues.

Health-promoting factors in medical students and students of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics: design and baseline results of a comparative longitudinal study

“…Consistent with earlier results on personality traits in medical students [48,49], we found low scores for neuroticism and high scores for agreeableness. Jerant et al [48] described the medical students in their sample as having higher levels of conscientiousness and agreeableness, similar levels of openness to experience and extraversion and lower levels of neuroticism, when compared to a general population sample.…”

Anxiety among Medical Students when Faced with the Practice of Anatomical Dissection

“…In fact, very few studies have not found significant gender differences (Snelling et al, ; Leboulanger, ). Basal anxiety levels (measured as “trait anxiety”) are similar independently of gender and are perceived more acutely by female students (Abu‐Hijelh et al, ; Arráez‐Aybar et al, ; Plaisant et al, ).…”

“…However, dissection is still the subject of debate and controversy (Ellis, ; McLachlan et al, ; Winkelmann, ; Böckers et al, ; Wilson et al, ). Around 16% of medical students claimed to have thoughts about diseases and death when faced with a cadaver (McLachlan et al, ; Lempp, ; Böckers et al, ; Plaisant et al, ; Goodwin et al, ). Anxiety is an emotional adaptive response to uncertain or alarming situations, and it forces us to take action and to find an appropriate response to deal with them.…”

Does personality predict medical students' attitudes to learning communication skills?

“…If personality influences students' attitudes, the assessment of personality traits could also enable medical educators to formulate strategies for the best development of academic and clinical competence. 19 The main aim of this study was to determine whether personality traits are related to medical students' attitudes towards learning communication skills. Based on prior work in the field of medicine about personality and other attitudes [19][20][21] , we hypothesized that there would be a significant relationship.…”

“…19 The main aim of this study was to determine whether personality traits are related to medical students' attitudes towards learning communication skills. Based on prior work in the field of medicine about personality and other attitudes [19][20][21] , we hypothesized that there would be a significant relationship. An additional goal was to analyze whether students' self-rated communication skills differ according to their personality traits.…”