Confidence Levels of Final-year Dental Students in Fixed Prosthodontic Procedures

Objectives: Lack of confidence may impact on students’ performance. This survey established confidence, difficulty and performance of final-year dental students during fixed prosthodontic training.

Methods: Students completed questionnaires after completion of the pre-clinical program (interval 1) and again after completion of required procedures on patients (interval 2). Questionnaires consisted of scale-based, dichotomous and open-ended questions. Relationships and comparisons among difficulty of procedures, confidence, students’ marks, time and gender were statistically analysed. Significance was determined at p<0.05.

Results: Forty four of 81 students completed both questionnaires (54% response rate, female n=28).
For intervals 1 and 2, higher difficulty scores were associated with lower confidence scores (spearman’s, rho=-0.659 and -0.578 respectively, p<0.001).
At both intervals, median of marks did not differ among confidence groups (Kruskal Wallis H test, Chi-squared = 5.665, df=3,p>0.05). At interval 1, there was no correlation between marks and confidence (rank correlation coefficient -0.115, p=0.386); At interval 2, there was mild +correlation (spearman’s rank, rho=0.317, p<0.05).
Using independent-samples t-tests, mean marks did not differ based on gender (interval 1: females 68.38, males 70.50; interval 2: males 66.77, females 65.76; p>0.05). Females had statistically higher mean difficulty scores only at interval 2 (11.14 and 9.44; p=0.017). Mean overall confidence score was statistically higher for males at interval 2 (16.69 and 14.82; p=0.005).
At interval 2, for both males and females, mean difficulty scores were significantly lower (paired t-test; p<0.001) and confidence was significantly higher (Wilcoxon signed rank test p<0.001).
There was a significant moderate correlation between preclinical and clinical marks for females (Pearson’s; r=0.39). For males, the correlation was poor and not significant.

Conclusions: Difficulty of procedures impacted negatively on confidence, but confidence didn’t impact on performance. Males and females performed equally well, but females found clinical work more difficult, resulting in lower confidence. Difficulty level decreased and confidence improved over time.