gms | German Medical Science

Introduction: In the medical domain, expertise requires the ability to examine complex, information-dense, visual material. Such visual material poses challenges; especially inexperienced individuals face difficulties as they are distracted by visually salient information instead of attending to thematically relevant areas [1]. We still know little about how the perceptual and cognitive system develops and how the learning process can be improved by training. A study is presented in which the gaze patterns and diagnostic skills of medical students before and after training in radiology were analysed to explore how they transform their knowledge.

Method: An experimental design with pre- and post-test was used. The experimental group participated in the training, while the control group did not 34 medical students in the clinical phase participated and they were equally distributed among the groups. A remote eye-tracker with a temporal resolution of 50 Hz and a spatial resolution (dispersion) of 1.0° visual angle was used. The subjects had to study 30 authentic x-ray images and decide whether a pathological finding was present and if so which one. Eye movements as well as verbal data were collected.

Results: Results show differences in pre- and post-test. In the post-test, students were more confident in their decision making and their diagnostic performance improved. Confidence and performance correlated significantly. However, the verbal data show that students faced difficulties in accurately naming the disease. No differences were found regarding time of inspection. The eye movements did not change significantly after training.

Discussion: Although the training has improved students’ performance, we do not yet see differences in their visual behaviour. At the conference, we will discuss these findings and explain how the combination of eye movements and verbal data can improve our understanding of cognitive and perceptual processing and help us improve learning environments in medical education.