Li Chunqing, Ye Xiaoyang, Yu Chen, Wu Hongbin
Institute of Medical Education/National Center for Health Professions Education Development, Peking University, Beijing, China.
Annenberg Institute for School Reform, Brown University, Providence, RI, United States.
Front Med (Lausanne). 2023 May 22;10:1101993. doi: 10.3389/fmed.2023.1101993. eCollection 2023.
The needs-based shortage of healthcare workers is severe worldwide and it would be exacerbated if many medical students switch to other careers after graduation. Maintaining and improving the career commitment of medical students, which could be a feasible, effective, and scalable way to reduce the attrition rate, is essential in medical education. We designed a randomized experiment to test whether an information intervention based on role modeling could enhance medical students' career commitment.
In the randomized experiment, the sample ( = 36,482) was divided into the treatment group ( = 18,070) and the control group ( = 18,412). The intervention information consisted of image-text messages on Zhong Nanshan, who is an inspiring role model for he went to the frontline of COVID-19 in the most critical circumstances and received praise and affirmation from the public. Α difference-in-differences model was employed to identify the effect of the information intervention. Heterogeneous treatment effects were identified using sub-sample analyses.
The results showed that the information intervention statistically significantly reduced medical students' dropout intention by 2.7 percentage points (95% CI: -0.037 to -0.016, = -4.95, < 0.001), equivalent to 14.6% of the control group mean. This estimate indicates that the information intervention could significantly increase the career commitment of medical students. Finally, male and senior students were influenced more than their female and junior counterparts, which can be explained by their relatively high dropout intention.
Role model-based information intervention improves the career commitment of medical students. The underlying behavioral model is that, when students use a role model as their reference point, they consider dropout as a substantial welfare loss. Role modeling is an effective way to improve the career commitment of medical students, especially for males and senior students.
基于需求的医护人员短缺在全球范围内都很严重，如果许多医学生毕业后转而从事其他职业，这种短缺情况将会加剧。在医学教育中，维持并提高医学生的职业承诺至关重要，这可能是一种可行、有效且可扩展的降低流失率的方法。我们设计了一项随机试验，以测试基于榜样示范的信息干预是否能增强医学生的职业承诺。
在随机试验中，样本（n = 36,482）被分为治疗组（n = 18,070）和对照组（n = 18,412）。干预信息由关于钟南山的图文信息组成，钟南山是一位鼓舞人心的榜样，因为他在最危急的情况下奔赴新冠疫情一线，并获得了公众的赞扬和肯定。采用双重差分模型来确定信息干预的效果。使用子样本分析来确定异质性治疗效果。
结果表明，信息干预在统计学上显著降低了医学生2.7个百分点的辍学意愿（95%置信区间：-0.037至-0.016，t = -4.95，p < 0.001），相当于对照组均值的14.6%。这一估计表明，信息干预可以显著提高医学生的职业承诺。最后，男生和高年级学生比女生和低年级学生受到的影响更大，这可以用他们相对较高的辍学意愿来解释。
基于榜样的信息干预提高了医学生的职业承诺。潜在的行为模型是，当学生以榜样为参照点时，他们会将辍学视为巨大的福利损失。榜样示范是提高医学生职业承诺的有效方法，尤其是对男生和高年级学生而言。
