Stephen Abrahamson

University of Southern California

There are many ways to consider medical education. In this chapter, medical
education is conceptualized as the complex of processes by which a medical student
is changed from a medical school applicant to a medical school graduate--with all
that is implied: from unknowing to knowing, from unskilled to skilled, from layman
to professional--in summary, from medical student to physician. The complex of
processes includes the following: learning by the medical students, teaching by the
faculty members of a medical school, and governance by the administrators of the
medical school. How these three processes are interwoven to form medical education
as we know it today warrants critical review.

Education can be thought of as a profession, and as such it includes a set of practices
and a body of sciences underlying those practices. Those who have studied education
maintain that the sciences provide the basis for the practices. Thus, a brief review of
some principles of learning should precede any discussion of practices of teaching.

Time and space do not permit the presentation of learning theory in detail.
Indeed, there are different theories of learning, each with a body of research
supporting it. But extant learning theories all agree on some basic principles which
the good teacher knows and attempts to apply.

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