Related Experiment Video
Updated: Nov 16, 2025

A Modified Trier Social Stress Test for Vulnerable Mexican American Adolescents
Published on: July 10, 2017
Ambiguity tolerance among medical students and its relationship with personality and participation in the mentoring
Amin Nakhostin-Ansari1,2, Nastaran Maghbouli1,3, Monir Shayestefar4
1Mentoring Office, School of Medicine, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.
Background:
Low ambiguity tolerance (AT) can lead to burnout and impact medical students' quality of life. Interventions are effective in increasing tolerance in ambiguous situations. Mentors can be facilitators in ambiguous situations. We aimed to determine the AT among Tehran University of medical sciences (TUMS) medical students and assess its relation with personality traits and mentor-seeking behavior.
Methods:
A cross-sectional study was designed. We used Budner AT questionnaire and the Ten Item Personality Inventory in our study. Questionnaires were sent to 350 randomly selected TUMS medical students in different years of education. Two hundred six students completed the questionnaires. The response rate was 58.85%.
Results:
The mean AT score was 59.77 among TUMS medical students. No significant difference was seen between different genders and students with different marital statuses. Also, AT was constant among students at different years at medical school and at different education levels (P > 0.05). Students who had participated in the mentoring program were significantly more intolerant of novel situations (P = 0.01). However, they did not have significantly different scores in other subscales of AT scale and its total score than those who had not participated in the mentoring program (P > 0.05).
Conclusion:
Medical students are more intolerant of ambiguity at TUMS than medical students abroad, and there should be interventions to help them cope in ambiguous situations. Mentoring programs may also be considered for future interventions as participants who participate in the program are less tolerant of ambiguity in novel situations.
More Related Videos
10:17Improving Student Outcomes with an Adaptable Molecular Cloning Course-Based Undergraduate Research Experience
Published on: November 15, 2024
10:26Problem-Solving Before Instruction PS-I: A Protocol for Assessment and Intervention in Students with Different Abilities
Published on: September 11, 2021
Related Concept Videos
Surveys
Cognitive Dissonance
Relationship Formation
Stereotype Content Model
Implicit Personality Theories
Self-Discrepancy Theory