Medical student use of practice questions in their studies: a qualitative study

• Published in: BMC medical education Vol. 24; no. 1; pp. 1181 - 7
• Main Authors: Sheehy, Ryan, Scott, Devin, Davis, Diveena, Roffler, Marissa, Sweatman, Trevor, Nemec, Eric
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: England BioMed Central Ltd 21.10.2024; BioMed Central; BMC
• Subjects: Adult Basic Education; Adult Students; Analysis; Beliefs, opinions and attitudes; College students; Curricula; Education, Medical, Undergraduate; Educational Measurement; Educational objectives; Educational research; Educational tests and measurements; Examinations; Extracurricular activities; Female; Humans; Internet resources; Interviews; Interviews as Topic; Learning; Licensing examinations; Male; Medical education; Medical school; Medical schools; Medical students; Methods; Practice questions; Professionals; Qualitative Research; Self evaluation; Students, Medical - psychology; Study strategies; Test Preparation; Undergraduate medical education; United States; United States > US; Practice questions; Qualitative research; Undergraduate medical education; Study strategies; Medical school
• ISSN: 1472-6920; 1472-6920
• DOI: 10.1186/s12909-024-06168-6

Practice questions are highly sought out for use as a study tool among medical students in undergraduate medical education. At the same time, it remains unknown how medical students use and incorporate practice questions and their rationales into their studies. To explore this heavily relied upon study strategy, semi-structured interviews were conducted with second-year medical students to assess how they approach using practice questions. Qualitative thematic analysis revealed several recurrent themes: (1) Medical students use practice questions for primary learning, (2) Medical students place more importance on the rationale of a practice question versus selecting the right answer, and (3) Medical students view practice questions as being designed to be used once or having a single-use. Together, these themes provide insight into how medical students use practice questions to study, which may guide medical educators in their creation of practice questions with appropriate rationales and provide foundational data for future mixed methods analyses seeking to generalize these findings.