Résumé
Objective: To determine whether students using mind maps would improve their performance in a final examination at the end of lecture-based pharmacology course
Study Design: A quasi-experimental study
Place and Duration of Study: Kunming Medical University, from September 2014 to January 2015
Methodology: One hundred and twenty-two [122] third year undergraduate medical students, starting a 48-hour lecture based pharmacology course, volunteered to use mind maps as one of their study strategies [intervention group], while the remaining 100 students in the class continued to use their usual study strategies [control group] over the duration of the course. The performance of both groups in the final course examination was compared. Students in the intervention group also completed a questionnaire on the usefulness of mind maps during the course and in preparation for the final examination
Results: The students' performance of intervention group was superior to performance of the control group in all parts of a multi-modal final examination. For the multiple choice questions and comprehensive scores, average marks of 45.97 +/-7.22 and 68.07 +/-12.77, respectively were acquired by the control group, and 51.77 +/-4.95 [p<0.01] and 80.05 +/-7.54 [p<0.01], respectively by the intervention group. The median IQR scores for "filling in the blanks" questions, short answers questions and case analyses, were 6.00 [6.00], 8.00 [3.50], 8.75 [5.88], respectively for the control group, and were all significantly higher at 8.00 [4.00] [p=0.024], 10.00 [2.00] [p<0.001], and 11.00 [3.25] [p=0.002], respectively for the intervention group. Questionnaire responses showed that 95.45% thought that mind maps helped them to prepare more efficiently for the final exam; 90.91% believed that mind maps helped them to better understand all of pharmacology. Ninety-one percent also thought that mind maps would help them to better understand other disciplines, and 86.36% students would like the lecturers to utilize mind mapping as an alternative to conventional teaching formats, such as the use of Power Point
Conclusion: The addition of mind maps to students' study of pharmacology at Kunming Medical University improved their performance in all aspects of a multi-modal final examination