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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Psychol.
Sec. Educational Psychology
Volume 15 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1330455

Community and Family Relationships across the Transition to Medical School: Links to Student Adjustment

Provisionally accepted
Brenda Rincon Brenda Rincon 1*Diamond Y. Bravo Diamond Y. Bravo 1Elisha Arnold Elisha Arnold 2Alexis Meza Alexis Meza 2Daisy Camacho-Thompson Daisy Camacho-Thompson 3
  • 1 University of California, Riverside, Riverside, United States
  • 2 New York University, New York City, New York, United States
  • 3 California State University, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, United States

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Supporting students during the transition to medical school is crucial for their academic adjustment. However, there has been limited research on the protective role of community and family support during this transition, despite evidence of the benefits of supportive relationships in higher education. Guided by self-determination theory, the current cross-sectional study explored how changes in family and community relationships impact Cuban medical students' sense of belonging in their field and their grade expectations. A total of 881 medical students (MAge = 21.51, SD = 2.23, range = 18-33; 54% female; 72.2% Cuban) participated in this study. Participants included students across six years of medical school (1st year = 14.4%, 2nd year = 9.8%, 3rd year = 23.6%, 4th year = 18.8%, 5th year = 11.6%, 6th year = 19.5%). Controlling for key demographics (e.g., student aid experience, family legacy, nationality, year in medical school, prior academic performance, gender, and offspring), our findings revealed that improvements in community relationships-rather than family relationships-were associated with higher levels of field belonging. Additionally, more extensive experience as a student aid and a greater number of family members with a medical background were linked to higher levels of field belonging and higher grade expectations. Notably, higher prior academic performance was associated with increased field belonging but did not affect grade expectations. Conversely, identifying as female was related to both higher field belonging and higher grade expectations. Our study highlights the importance of supportive community relationships for medical students' academic adjustment. We discuss the potential benefits of enhancing community relationships within medical school training programs.

    Keywords: Medical students, field belonging, Grade expectations, community support changes, family support changes

    Received: 30 Oct 2023; Accepted: 12 Aug 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Rincon, Bravo, Arnold, Meza and Camacho-Thompson. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Brenda Rincon, University of California, Riverside, Riverside, United States

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.