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A 6‐year follow‐up of the Type A behaviour pattern in medical students
Author(s) -
JONES K. V.,
LEBNAN V.
Publication year - 1988
Publication title -
medical education
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.776
H-Index - 138
eISSN - 1365-2923
pISSN - 0308-0110
DOI - 10.1111/j.1365-2923.1988.tb00009.x
Subject(s) - significant difference , psychology , type a and type b personality theory , medicine , demography , clinical psychology , social psychology , personality , sociology
Summary. A sample of 104 medical students was tested for the Type A behaviour pattern, using the Jenkins Activity Survey (Form N fully weighted and Form C Glass Student scores) at four points over a 6‐year period during the medical course. Fully weighted Type A scores showed a significant increase over the first 3 years of the course, followed by a drop—to approximately second‐year levels—by the end of the 6‐year period. A similar but non‐significant pattern was observed for the Glass scores. It was suggested that the decrease in the scores was related to lesser usefulness of the Type A pattern during the clinical years of the medical course. A significant difference was found for the final written examination, with those who scored above the median on the Glass Student Type A scale doing better than low scorers. This result was not replicated for the fully weighted Type A scores. It may be that there is some specific usefulness of Type A responding for performance on written examinations, although no equivalent performance difference was found for the final clinical examination.