JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Choosing and matching into one's preferred specialty is one of the most important and potentially stressful concerns medical students face. Many factors play a role in specialty chose such as prior life experiences, lifestyle, and how well a medical student feels they fit in with the personalities of said specialty. This study examines the relationship between neuroticism and specialty choice among medical students at a single U.S. allopathic medical school using the Big Five Inventory and proprietary questions to quantify neurotic personality traits and specialty perceptions in current US medical students. Respondents interested in surgical specialties believed that surgical specialties were more competitive than medical specialties, but were not found to be more neurotic than their medicine counterparts. Additionally, those whose interested included both surgical and medical specialties were found to be less neurotic than their peers. The results of this study indicate that medical students are already cognizant and concerned about matching into their desired specialties in their preclinical potion of their medical education.