Cross-Sectional Study on Exam Anxiety among Medical Students of a Tertiary Care Teaching Hospital of Western India -

Background: Students with test anxiety feel tense, fearful and worried in evaluative situations. This study was carried out with the objective to find out the levels of exam anxiety and factors contributing to it.Methodology: It was a cross-sectional study conducted among 150 randomly selected medical students with the help of a tool used for measuring exam anxiety, Test Anxiety Inventory (TAI). Results: The mean score of TAI-worry was 16.95 (+ 3.39), TAI-emotionality was 17.04 (+ 2.901) and that of TAI-total was 41.99 (+5.336). The TAI-emotionality subscale and TAI-total scores was higher in female medical students. Those students who were living in hostel had higher mean TAI-emotionality scores. No significant difference between TAI-worry, TAI-emotionality and TAI-total with respect to regular/repeater batch, parental pressure, extent of course of study and duration of exams. No association was found TAI-total with year of study in MBBS and medium of study in higher secondary education.Conclusion: The total anxiety scores were significantly higher among female medical students. The emotional effect of exam anxiety was significantly higher among the female medical students than the males and among the students living at hostel than those living with their families.