Conceptualizing Humility in Medical Education: Insights from US Student Perspectives

Humility is increasingly recognized as a vital element of medical professionalism, yet little is known about how medical students perceive and enact it during their formative training years. This cross-sectional study explores US medical students' (n = 104) understandings and experiences across four years of medical education. Quantitative analyses, drawing on the Honesty-Humility subscale of the Honesty-Humility (H), Emotionality (E), Extroversion (X), Agreeableness (A), Conscientiousness (C), Openness to Experience (0) Personality Inventory Revised (HEXACO-PI-R), revealed no significant differences in humility by year, gender, or race/ethnicity. Qualitative analyses of survey narratives, however, highlighted three interrelated themes: (1) humility is learned primarily through informal mechanisms such as role modeling, patient encounters, and reflection rather than through formal curricula; (2) humility is seen as essential for fostering teamwork, collaboration, and trust among peers, colleagues, and patients; and (3) students grapple with balancing humility and projecting confidence, especially in clinical contexts where they feel patients' trust depends on perceived competence. Findings suggest that humility in medical education is not simply a personal disposition but a relational and cultural practice shaped by organizational norms, hidden curricula, and professional identity formation. Embedding humility-supportive practices into mentorship, feedback, and team-based learning environments may help normalize humility as a valued dimension of professionalism and enhance the cultivation of reflective, collaborative physicians.