A Foppish Medical Student Smoking a Cigarette, Denoting a Cavalier Attitude

What should we expect of medical students? Should we expect them to adhere to high standards of ethical and professional behaviours at all times? Or is that expecting too much? There are two schools of thought. Some are concerned that moral development may regress during medical school. For example Shimon Glick has written that ‘unfortunately there are troubling, if inconclusive, data that suggest that during medical school the ethical behaviour of medical students does not necessarily improve; indeed, moral development may actually stop or even regress’ ( ² ). On the other hand, some think that medical students should be allowed a wide berth. Roger Allen has put it colourfully: ‘we need reprobates, beer spillers, card sharps, bong puffers, the irreverent and the like in medical students. It is their job’ ( ³ ).