Imposter Syndrome Amongst Medical Students and Resident Doctors in Croatia

Sunčana Vlah Tomičević, Valerija Bralić Lang

Keywords: imposter syndrome, medical students, residents, Croatia

Background:

Imposter syndrom (IS) is defined as impossibility to accept credits for objectively own success but rather contributing it to external factors like luck, acquaintances or a mistake with simultaneously feeling like a fraud. It starts at a young age, potentiates during schooling, and is more often seen in highly successful professionals, women and young people. IS is related to negative psychological outcomes. Although present, isn’t well researched in medical comunity. Since doctors and medical students have a higher prevalence of burnout, anxiety, and depression IS should be considered as a possible impact on the results.

Research questions:

Primary objective is to research the prevalence of IS and it’s differences amongst 1st, 4th, 6th year medical students in School of Medicine in Zagreb and young doctors during residency. Other objective is to compare their negative psychological outcomes (depression, anxiety, and stress) and prevalence of IS. In the end, prevalence of IS, depression, anxiety, and stress amongst medical students and residents will be compared with the general population expecting higher results in our medical sample.

Method:

An anonymus questionnaire that can be filled only once with demographic data (age, sex, student or resident status), Clance Impostor Phenomenon Scale (CIPS), and Depression Anxiety and Stress Scale 21 (DASS-21) will be presented to the students and residents during class (Psychology medicine, Psychiatry, Family medicine, General skills). Each student and resident will mark their questionnaire with a unique code so results of CIPS can be compared with their DASS-21 results. CIPS consists of 20 statement, is validated, translated to Croatian and most often used tool for IS. DASS-21 is a self-reported 21-item instrument, also validated and translated to Croatian that, with defined thresholds, quantifies depression, anxiety, and stress. Using statistical analysis, connection between IS and depression, anxiety, and stress will be researched.

Results:

Conclusions:

Points for discussion:

Effects of medical schooling on IS

Are negative psychological outcomes caused by IS?

Time and ways of intervention to ease the IS