To determine what factors influence medical students' perception of the
application and selection procedures of psychiatric residency programs, the
authors sent a questionnaire to 100 medical students interviewed for the
residency program at a major psychiatric facility; 43 returned the forms.
There was general concordance between the respondents' perception of the
institution's selection criteria and their convictions regarding what those
criteria ought to be, with the exception that applicants tended to
downgrade the dean's letter. Factors important in the residents' evaluation
were the warmth, enthusiasm, and interviewing skills of the faculty and
residents. They did not object to psychologically probing interviews if the
interviews were skillfully conducted. It was important to them that they
met the chairman and program director, and if the applicant was a woman,
she wanted to have at least one woman interviewer.
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