A Study of the Impacts of Medical Dramas on High School Students’ Career Aspirations and Expectations

Abstract

Medical dramas can present inaccurate representations of the medical profession yet they are watched by millions of individuals around the world each year. Due to this dilemma, previous research has focused on various societal effects of medical dramas, such as their spread of misinformation regarding CPR. To fill a gap in this existing conversation, this study investigated how medical dramas impact high school students’ career aspirations and expectations. Through utilizing a mixed method of electronic questionnaires distributed to high school students and semi-structured interviews with a variety of medical professionals, this study found that while medical dramas are unlikely to be determining factors for high school students’ career aspirations, they do have an effect on these aspirations, such as exposing their high school viewers to previously unknown specialties. Additionally, a thematic analysis of gathered data revealed that high school students’ expectations for careers in medicine are largely inconsistent with the experiences of medical professionals in terms of high school students’ lack of recognition of the systemic obstacles to patient care. Consequently, many high school students are developing unrealistic career aspirations based on misunderstandings of the medical profession.