Perception of childhood dissatisfaction with parents and selected personality traits in adulthood.

This study tested the hypotheses that perceptions of childhood dissatisfaction with parents are associated with higher scores on measures of intensity and chronicity of loneliness, anxiety, neuroticism, psychoticism, misanthropy, and external locus of control and lower scores on measures of self-esteem and sociability. The subjects were 537 Iranian students studying in American and Iranian universities. Both hypotheses were confirmed in a multivariate statistical model.

Postbaccalaureate preparation and performance in medical school.

The question whether postbaccalaureate preparation before matriculation in medical school contributes to medical students' performance was addressed by this study. A total of 610 (91%) of the students who entered Jefferson Medical College between 1985 and 1987 were the study sample. Fifty-eight of these students had taken nondegree undergraduate premedical courses and 15 had taken nondegree graduate courses.

[Sea-urchin injuries].

Sea urchins (Echinoidea) are found along the Mediterranean and especially the Red Sea coasts of Israel. The most important species are Diadema setosum on the Red Sea coast, and Paracentrus lividus on the Mediterranean. When stepped on, the brittle spines penetrate and the venom they carry causes further damage.

A controlled trial to improve delivery of preventive care: physician or patient reminders?

Objective: To improve the delivery of preventive care in a medical clinic, a controlled trial was conducted of two interventions that were expected to influence delivery of preventive services differently, depending on level of initiative required of the physician or patient to complete a service.

Design: A prospective, controlled trial of five-months' duration.

Setting: A university hospital-based, general medical clinic.

Students' certainty during course test-taking and performance on clerkships and board exams.

Psychometric aspects of multiple-choice tests were investigated using a confidence-weighted scoring technique. The contributions of two indices, overconfidence and underconfidence, in the prediction of subsequent academic performance of examinees were studied. A total of 444 sophomore students (entering classes of 1982 and 1983) in one medical school were asked to indicate their confidence, on a 5-point scale (100, 75, 50, 25, and 0), in the correctness of their responses to each multiple-choice item on an Introduction to Clinical Medicine examination.