title: Impact of personality temperaments and characters on academic performance and specialty selection among a group of Egyptian medical graduates.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  The relationship between personality temperaments, academic achievement and specialty interest is important because of its implications in career counseling.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  To assess the effect of personality on academic performance and career selection and to study the impact of some sociodemographic factors on academic achievement and career choice of medical graduates.
  
  
  METHODS
  A total of 436 medical graduates of Ain Shams medical school were approached, out of which 331 participated. They were given a sociodemographic questionnaire, and the Temperament and Character Inventory-Revised (TCI-R; 240) for personality construct; they had to answer questions about academic achievement, ranking, scores and choice of medical specialty.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Novelty seeking (NS1, NS2 and NS3) and self-transcendence (ST1 and ST2) were correlated with graduation ranking, (r = .2, p = .00; r = .15, p = .009; r = .16, p = .005; r = .12, p = .003; r = .14, p = .02; r = .17, p = .004; r = .13, p = .03, respectively), that is, lower NS and ST had better academic outcome. Only high school score was associated with better achievement (p = .00). In specialty selection, females were significantly overrepresented in pediatrics and clinical pathology, whereas males were significantly predominating surgical specialties except for obstetrics and gynecology (p = .00). Students choosing patient-centered specialties had higher reward dependence (RD), persistence (PS) and cooperativeness (C); those choosing clinical pathology had highest harm avoidance (HA), whereas those choosing radiology had lowest HA and those choosing surgery had significantly higher self-directedness (SD3).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Personality impacts academic achievement and specialty choice with other factors as gender and previous scholastic performance.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Psychiatry, Ain Shams University, Cairo, Egypt mona.m.elsheikh@gmail.com monaelsheikh@hotmail.com.
authors.forename: Mona M
authors.initials: MM
authors.lastname: El Sheikh
authors.affiliation: Institute of Psychiatry, Ain Shams University, Cairo, Egypt.
authors.forename: Nermin M
authors.initials: NM
authors.lastname: Shaker
authors.affiliation: Institute of Psychiatry, Ain Shams University, Cairo, Egypt.
authors.forename: Hanan
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Hussein
authors.affiliation: Institute of Psychiatry, Ain Shams University, Cairo, Egypt.
authors.forename: Hisham A
authors.initials: HA
authors.lastname: Ramy
mesh_terms: D002321:Career Choice; D002605:Character; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D004522:Educational Status; D004534:Egypt; D005106:Exploratory Behavior; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008511:Medicine / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D010555:Personality Inventory; D012737:Sex Factors; D013337:Students, Medical / Q000523:psychology*; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D013694:Temperament; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Personality; academic achievement; career; medical; specialty; students; temperaments