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Turkish Journal of Medical Sciences

Abstract

Background/aim: One mission of medical faculties is training scientists equipped with the necessary knowledge, skills, attitudes, who can evaluate the scientific research. The aim was to develop a scale for evaluating the level of scientific competence and activity in research assistants.

Materials and methods: The study is a methodological study, conducted in October 2023-May 2024 with 299 research assistants working at X University Faculty of Medicine. The reliability was assessed by item-total correlation and Cronbach-alpha coefficient; construct validity was assessed by EFA. In EFA, principal component analysis, Varimax rotation were used. KMO and Barttlet test p value were calculated. Groups with eigenvalues ​​greater than one were determined as factors. The ability of the scale score to determine the level of scientific competence and activity was examined by ROC curve analysis. SPSS 30.0 was used, significance was taken as p<0.05.

Results: KMO value is 0.945, Barttlet's test p is <0.001. Seven items were removed. As a result of Varimax rotation, four sub-dimensions were determined; factor 1 (fourteen items), factor 2 (eight items), factor 3 (four items), factor 4 (three items). Cronbach-alpha coefficient is 0.960, item-total correlation coefficients are greater than 0.3. The mean score was 91.23 ± 23.10. According to the ROC analysis for participation in at least one publication/project, the cut-off point was 92.

Conclusion: The Scientific Competence and Activity Scale consists of 29 items in 4 sub-dimensions, it is valid, reliable. To generalize its validity and reliability, it is crucial to test the theoretical structure of the scale in various groups.

Author ORCID Identifier

CEMAL KOÇAK: 0000-0003-4799-5669

HANDE GÜVERCİN: 0009-0007-5271-3327

ECEM ESEN: 0000-0002-0169-9111

MELTEM ÇÖL: 0000-0001-7089-1644

DOI

10.55730/1300-0144.6026

Keywords

academic life, evidence-based medicine, Medical faculty research assistants, research knowledge and skills, The Scientific Competence and Activity Scale

First Page

768

Last Page

781

Publisher

The Scientific and Technological Research Council of Türkiye (TÜBİTAK)

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

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