Affiliation:
1. Department of Basic Sciences, Faculty of Medicine, The Hashemite University, PO Box 330127,
Zarqa 13133, Jordan
Abstract
Background:
Differences in personality may have an impact on academic performance,
however, academic assessments aim to measure knowledge, skills, and behavior
domains rather than personality.
Objectives:
To investigate the relation between personality traits and academic performance
of medical students and evaluate if correlations between personality traits and examination
scores are affected by gender or stage of study (pre-clinical versus clinical).
Methods:
This cross-sectional study used an online questionnaire to identify Big Five Model
personality traits of medical students at the Hashemite University, Jordan. A stratified
sampling technique, according to the stage of study and gender, resulted in a sample
of 307 medical students who completed the questionnaire. Grade Point Average (GPA)
scores, as a measure of academic performance, were retrieved from the University database
for each participant and data was analysed using SPSS 16.0. The correlation between personality
traits and GPA score was investigated using Pearson coefficient. Two-way
ANOVA testing investigated the effect of gender and stage of study and the interaction of
these factors with personality traits on GPA.
Results:
Only conscientiousness had a significant positive correlation with GPA (r = .231, p
< .001). Two-way ANOVA showed only conscientiousness had a statistically significant
effect on GPA (F (1, n=307) = 10.353, p = .001). Investigating the interaction between gender,
stage of study and personality traits on GPA, showed only a statistically significant interaction
effect between stage of study and openness on GPA (F (1, n=307) = 10.297, p
=.001).
Conclutions:
Overall, personality traits did not unduly influence the assessment procedures,
except a positive correlation of conscientiousness with academic performance and interaction
between openness and stage of study with academic performance. These findings, from
a developing country, advance our understanding of correlations between personality traits
and academic performance and may inform the development of equitable assessments in
similar contexts worldwide.
Publisher
Bentham Science Publishers Ltd.
Subject
Psychiatry and Mental health
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