Mindset of the First-Year Medical Students, Naresuan University

Abstract

Background and Objectives: Mindsets are people's beliefs about their own basic characteristics. Each person's mindset affects how they think, feel, and act. People with a growth mindset, when encountering obstacles, they will not give up. As opposed to people with a fixed mind set, when encountering hardships, they retreat. There are many factors in the life of studying medicine that can put pressure on students to develop mental health problems which affect their learning and work performance. Although mindset is an important factor affecting ability to face obstacles during education, data on medical students' mindset has not been studied before. Therefore researchers wanted to study mindset of the first year medical students at Naresuan University to provide basic information for designing an appropriate educational model for students.

Method: A cross-sectional descriptive study with a mindset assessment questionnaire measure the mindset of first-year medical students, Naresuan University. Collecting data from 175 first-year medical students, Faculty of Medicine, Naresuan University. Data was analyzed using frequency, percentage, mean, standard deviation, and One-way ANOVA.

Results: There were 164 first-year medical students, Faculty of Medicine. Naresuan University, participated in the study. Everyone possesses a combination of fixed and growth mindsets. In each topic, students with a growth mindset are more numerous than those with a fixed mindset, except for the topic of change in the fundamental aspect of one’s identity, where students with a fixed mindset are more prevalent. Students of varying ages, genders, hometowns, admission programs, cumulative high school grade point averages, parental occupations, and types of high schools they graduated from do not show a statistically significant difference (p < 0.05) in their average scores of mindset.

Conclusion: First-year medical students of  Naresuan University exhibit mixed mindsets, which indicates that they still have fixed mindsets. This information can be utilized by the faculty to tailor their educational approach towards fostering a growth mindset among medical students.