Measurement of self-perception of self-direction in undergraduate medical students

Abstract

Introduction: Medical Schools have make a commitment to both students and society to develop in their students the skills required to succeed on the complex health care environments.

Objective: The present study was conducted to assess one of several generic competencies on medical students: self-direction disposition. It is proposed based on a model of three subcategories, which was applied on the Individual Generic Skills Test: self-direction section.

Method: The instrument was validated on content by a group of 20 experts on medical education and applied to the total student population (135) registered on the sixth-year of the M.D. Physician Surgeon program at a private medical school. The instrument was analyzed using factor analysis, Cronbach’s alpha coefficient and descriptive statistics. 

Results: Cronbach’s alpha indicated an internal consistency of 0.659 for the Self-direction section and 0.779 for the complete instrument. The findings suggest that selected items have both homogeneity and validity. The factor analysis resulted on components that were associated to three self-direction subcategories.

Conclusions: The student’s perceptions are higher in the Emotional intelligence and Continuous improvement, with an average of 1.306 and 1.659; which indicates that the university must propose learning strategies to promote in the students more organization and planning of their learning strategies.