[Working conditions of medical students--medical students and research]

A questionnaire survey was conducted among 33 medical students (22 men and 11 women) working as part or full-time research trainees at the University of Bergen in 1990, in order to examine various aspects of their working conditions. Most trainees (81%) experienced a well-organized initial research project, and 85% were quite content with their personal supervision. The students "defined" two hours per week as an "adequate amount" of supervision. A higher percentage of the male trainees were first author of scientific publications, while a higher percentage of the females felt that they had learned something from their scientific training. Surprisingly perhaps, relatively more of the female wished to do research full time in the future. 94% of the research trainees recommended other medical students to participate in research training programmes during their student career.