Virginia Research Day 2021

IDENTIFYING AND MONITORING CHANGES IN THE STUDY HABITS OF FIRST-YEAR MEDICAL SCHOOL STUDENTS Connor Arrasmith, OMS-II, Ethan Parker, OMS-II, Scott Severance, PhD.

Methods (Contd.) Sample ASSIST Questions: 1. I usually set out to understand for myself the meaning of what we have to learn. 2. I manage to find conditions for studying which allow me to get on with my work easily. 3. I find I have to concentrate on just memorizing a good deal of what I have to learn. Supplemental Questions: 1. How old are you? 2. What is your gender? 3. Which of the following degrees have you earned? (BA, BS, Post-bac, MA, MS, JD, PhD, PharmD, other) 4. Are you repeating all or part of the current academic year? 5. Which of the following methods did you most commonly use to study in the degree program completed before medical school? (Alone, with a friend, with a group, other) 6. Prior to entering Medical School, did you work in the medical field? 7. If yes, in what capacity and for how long did you work in the medical field? Data After analyzing the beginning-of-year surveys for the 111 viable responses, we categorized the initial learning approach of 57 participants as strategic, 47 as deep, and 3 as surface. Interestingly, 2 participants scored equally high between deep and strategic approaches and have thus been placed in their own unique category.

Introduction In the world of education, great attention is given to categorizing approaches to learning and using this understanding to best maximize education. Current literature lacks clear definitions for learning approaches, leaving findings abstract without the ability to compare results across studies. This project utilizes the ASSIST Questionnaire, a 52- question Likert Scale survey, to differentiate between three different learning approaches which have been strictly defined. This approach allowed us to assign medical students to one of three categories and provided a methodology to look for correlations between learning approaches and specific student characteristics. Furthermore, by utilizing a pre-set list of questions, we establish standardized reproducibility for future studies. Methods At the beginning of the 2020-2021 academic year, the OMS-I class was asked to complete the ASSIST Questionnaire and supplemental questions. Surveys completed only prior to the first examination were accepted to prevent alterations to study approaches in response to exam scores. Of the 160 enrolled first-year students, 115 completed the survey; 111 responses were viable for analysis, resulting in a 69% participation rate. Responses were then assessed according to the ASSIST Questionnaire pre-set algorithm, and students were placed into one of the three following categories: deep, surface, and strategic. The students will be asked to take the same survey after the final assessment of their OMS-I year, which will allow a side-by-side comparison of alterations in learning approaches that occurred over the course of the year. Additionally, de-identified course grades will be analyzed to determine if there is a correlation between a student’s learning approach and academic progression.

References 1. Abedin, N. F., Jaafar, Z., Husain, S., & Abdullah, R. (2013). The Validity of ASSIST as a Measurement of Learning Approach among MDAB Students. Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences, 90 , 549-557. 2. Brown, Stephen; White, Sue; Wakeling, Lara; and Naiker, Mani, Approaches and Study Skills Inventory for Students (ASSIST) in an Introductory Course in Chemistry., Journal of University Teaching & Learning Practice , 12(3), 2015 3. Chonkar, S. P., Ha, T. C., Chu, S., Ng, A. X., Lim, M., Ee, T. X., Ng, M. J., & Tan, K. H. (2018). The predominant learning approaches of medical students. BMC medical education , 18 (1), 17. 4. Dinsmore DL, Alexander PA. A critical discussion of deep and surface processing: What it means, how it is measured, the role of context, and model specification. Educational Psychology Review. 2012;24(4):499–567. 5. Donnison, S., & Penn-Edwards, S. (2012). Focusing on first year assessment: Surface or deep approaches to learning? The International Journal of the First Year in Higher Education, 3 (2). 6. Liew SC, Sidhu J, Barua A. The relationship between learning preferences (styles and approaches) and learning outcomes among pre-clinical undergraduate medical students. BMC Med Educ . 2015;15:44. changing the learning habits of future students, and elevating the capabilities of physicians in training. Expectations The second survey is scheduled to be completed at the end of the academic year in spring of 2021; we expect to detect a shift away from strategic and surface learning approaches toward a deep learning approach. We also expect to see a correlation between age, previous healthcare experience, and prior level of education with analyzed learning approaches at the beginning of the year. We anticipate that the results of this study could be useful in refining medical school admissions criteria,

Beginning of Academic Year Survey Response by Learning Approach Surface

Strategic

Deep/Strategic

Deep

This study is conducted with LU IRB approval (Protocol # FY 19-20-371).

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