Peer evaluations in an anonymous and open system: Intern reactions and evaluation analysis

Feedback and evaluation from peers is fundamental to trainees' professional development but may be uncomfortable to provide non-anonymously. We aimed to understand resident perception of anonymous and open written evaluation systems and to analyze evaluations in each of these systems.

We compared two years of intern peer evaluations at a large United States-based pediatric residency program - the 2018-2019 and 2019-2020 years during which intern peer evaluations were anonymous and open, respectively. We electronically surveyed interns about their perceptions of peer evaluations and analyzed four aspects of the evaluations themselves: (1) orientation, (2) caliber, (3) Likert-scale, and (4) word count.

40 (78%) and 38 (75%) interns participated in the survey in the anonymous and open years, respectively. Respondents reported being more likely to avoid writing constructive comments in the open year. There were more high caliber comments in the open year. Likert-scale ratings of peers were lower in the open year. Word count was longer in the open year.

While interns expressed more discomfort evaluating peers in an open evaluation system, they wrote longer and more high caliber comments in an open system than in an anonymous system. Residency programs should consider professional development in writing peer evaluation.