Development of a method to investigate medical students' perceptions of their personal and professional development.

Personal and Professional Development (PPD) is now key to the undergraduate medical curriculum and requires provision of appropriate learning experiences. In order to achieve this, it is essential that we ascertain students' perceptions of what is important in their PPD. We required a methodological approach suitable for a large medical school, which defines constructs used by the students to describe their PPD, and is not constrained by a researcher's predetermined line of questioning.