Table 2.
Attitudes of family practice residents towards primary care research and research activities during residency training
| STATEMENT (all items measured on 10 point Likert scale: 1 'Strongly disagree'; 10 'Strongly agree) | Overall Mean (SD) (n = 52) | Research stream Mean (SD) (n = 11) | Regular stream Mean (SD) (n = 41) | p* value |
| With the increased emphasis on primary care, there is a need for strengthening the scientific foundations of clinical practice. | 7.9 (1.7) | 9.1 (1.5) | 7.6 (1.6) | .008 |
| Family medicine residents should be required to carry out research projects as part of their residency. | 4.6 (2.8) | 6.2 (3.1) | 4.2 (2.6) | .037 |
| Research is adequately emphasized in family medicine training at McMaster. | 5.6 (2.0) | 4.0 (2.0) | 6.0 (1.8) | .002 |
| The lack of a critical mass of investigators is a major impediment to the development of primary care research. | 6.1 (1.9) | 7.5 (2.4) | 5.7 (1.6) | .007 |
| Developing a culture of primary care research must occur early in professional medical education. | 6.6 (2.4) | 8.5 (2.3) | 6.1 (2.2) | .003 |
| It is imperative that the "evidence" in the Evidence-Based Medicine paradigm is developed by primary care researchers. | 5.8 (2.3) | 5.9 (1.9) | 5.8 (2.4) | .845 |
| Every family medicine resident should be assigned to a research mentor at the beginning of their training. | 5.2 (2.9) | 6.0 (2.9) | 5.0 (2.9) | .301 |
| Family medicine faculty at McMaster are knowledgeable about research. | 6.3 (1.8) | 5.4 (2.0) | 6.5 (1.6) | .052 |
| I am not interested in research activities. | 5.5 (3.3) | 2.2 (2.1) | 6.5 (2.9) | .000 |
| There is a lack of dedicated time to pursue research activities during the residency training. | 7.4 (2.0) | 8.3 (1.7) | 7.2 (2.1) | .121 |
| I have good research skills. | 5.4 (1.9) | 5.7 (2.6) | 5.3 (1.7) | .549 |
| I would like to get more research training as part of the family medicine residency training. | 5.9 (3.1) | 8.8 (2.0) | 5.1 (2.8) | .000 |
| There are no opportunities for family medicine residents to participate in primary care research. | 3.6 (1.9) | 3.5 (1.6) | 3.6 (1.9) | .838 |
| There are no family medicine research role models in our department. | 3.9 (2.3) | 3.8 (2.1) | 3.9 (2.4) | .892 |
| There is sufficient statistical/epidemiological support available to residents who are interested in research. | 5.8 (2.1) | 4.5 (2.0) | 6.2 (2.1) | .017 |
* Based on Student's t-tests