Peer assessment of professionalism in undergraduate medical education

Abstract

Background Fostering professional behaviour has become increasingly important in medical education and non-traditional approaches to assessment of professionalism may offer a more holistic representation of students’ professional behaviour development. Emerging evidence suggests peer assessment may offer potential as an alternative method of professionalism assessment. We introduced peer assessment of professionalism in pre-clerkship phases of undergraduate medical education curriculum at our institution and evaluated suitability of adopting a professional behaviour scale for longitudinal tracking of student development, and student comfort and acceptance of peer assessment. Methods Peer assessment was introduced using a validated professional behaviours scale. Students conducted repeated, longitudinal assessments of their peers from small-group, clinical skills learning activities. An electronic assessment system was used to collect peer assessments, collate and provide reports to students. Student opinions of peer assessment were initially surveyed before introducing the process, confirmatory analyses were conducted of the adopted scale, and students were surveyed to explore satisfaction with the peer assessment process. Results Students across all phases of the curriculum were initially supportive of anonymous peer assessment using small-group learning sessions. Peer scores showed improvement over time, however the magnitude of increase was limited by ceiling effects attributed to the adopted scale. Students agreed that the professional behaviours scale was easy to use and understand, however a majority disagreed that peer assessment improved their understanding of professionalism or was a useful learning experience. Conclusions Peer assessment of professional behaviours does expose students to the process of assessing one’s peers, however the value of such processes at early stages of medical education may not be fully recognized nor appreciated by students. Electronic means for administering peer assessment is feasible for collecting and reporting peer feedback. Improvement in peer assessed scores was observed over time, however student opinions of the educational value were mixed and indeterminate.

The relationship between medical student engagement in the provision of the school’s education programme and learning outcomes

“…The success of peer assessment could depend on several factors, including the type of peer assessment, e.g. formative or summative; anonymity; and students' accustom towards doing peer assessments (Curran et al 2020;Lerchenfeldt and Taylor 2020). Conducting a successful peer assessment requires the institution to provide clear introductions and help their students prepare well (Curran et al 2020).…”

“…formative or summative; anonymity; and students' accustom towards doing peer assessments (Curran et al 2020;Lerchenfeldt and Taylor 2020). Conducting a successful peer assessment requires the institution to provide clear introductions and help their students prepare well (Curran et al 2020). To enhance learning outcomes, medical students could consciously increase their participation in certain types of educational student engagement.…”

Otoskills training during covid-19 pandemic: a before-after study

“…This effect has been described before and seems related to deficiencies in self-assessment [ 27 , 28 ], with students thinking they are doing better than they truly are. The magnitude of increase could also be limited by a ceiling effect attributed to the adopted scale [ 29 ]. This highlights the importance of high-quality performance evaluations.…”

Professionalism in small group learning between face-to-face and virtual settings: a mixed-methods study

“…Curran and his collaborators examined the internal structure of a peer assessment tool regarding professionalism and investigated the overall satisfaction with peer assessment. 14 Their study found mixed feelings about peer assessment and identified a lack of constructive feedback as a limitation. A systematic review was conducted to examine the utilization of small-group peer feedback in student learning and professional development.…”