Editorial: Prep your personality, dear premed

For an applicant, getting into medical school has long been a balancing act. A student is… For an applicant, getting into medical school has long been a balancing act. A student is assessed on several main qualities and competencies, including a solid GPA, good MCAT scores and varied extracurricular activities, preferably including clinical experience, volunteering and taking part in some form of scientific research. Letters of recommendation and countless essays also accompany the application.

The latter ostensibly gives admissions committees a taste of the applicant’s personality. However, the interview, if the applicant is so worthy, enables schools to decide whether an applicant has the right material to be a doctor.

A recent study in the Journal of Applied Psychology addresses an alternative method: a personality test.

The study focused on the Big Five personality traits: extraversion, neuroticism, openness, agreeableness and conscientiousness — the five broad traits defining human personality in contemporary psychology.

Psychologists in the study administered the test to 600 students in Belgium, where the premedical and medical curriculum is similar to curriculum in the United States. It focuses on understanding the basic sciences in the early years and concentrates on clinical knowledge in the later years. They then followed these students throughout their education, noting academic performance and attrition rates.

Neuroticism correlated with poor academic performance and attrition. Conscientiousness showed to be a strong predictor of success in medical school. The importance of openness, agreeableness and extraversion increased over time with extraversion being the most significant, as later years in education included more time with patients.

The study suggests standardizing the methods medical schools use for understanding a potential student’s personality. Currently, recommendations, essays and interviews suffice. This is a relatively variable method considering how cognitive ability is traditionally assessed.

Although this would level the playing field for applicants and reduce unintentional advantages and disadvantages of the current system, like different interviewers, it still leaves questions about its feasibility and validity.

The inalienable right to pursue happiness entails that anyone can make anything of himself or herself. Every American can achieve a better life, even if that is defined as an acceptance letter to medical school. Personality is inherent, and falling short on a category on any such test could not be penalized, as that would be limiting a person based on what they cannot work harder to improve. Maybe the test would have to find a way around this.

Another concern would be that the test would be standardized. Forty years ago, a high school student signed up for his SAT, sat for the test and left the testing center. Today, one can find endless books and courses on how to ace the exam. Similarly, given enough time, this test too could become a target of test prep companies, or websites at the least, aiming to help students get in.

There will always be students who know how to perfect their application in each and every category — this personality test will be no different.

Although a proposed personality test could include a system to detect the veracity of student’s responses, many still will answer what they feel an admissions officer would most want to see. If different medical schools value different focuses more, such as research versus primary care, different personalities would serve each one differently. This would provide a firewall against students trying to dupe the test.

The study had a good intent in proposing such standardization, that is, standardization itself, in making the application process more fair. It also provides hope for those that feel they have the right material to be a doctor, but are afraid their multiple choice exams might not make their dream reachable. However, the implementation of such a test would have to be wary of effectiveness and validity.

If premeds want to see how they would fare in such a system, they can take the Big Five Personality Test on Facebook, a similar test in the categories tested. For now, continue studying organic chemistry, which is still required for admission, alas.