Peer Teaching in Undergraduate Medical Education: What are the Learning Outputs for the Student-Teachers? A Systematic Review

Abstract

Introduction: To achieve quality in medical education, peer teaching, understood as students taking on roles as educators for peers, is frequently used as a teaching intervention. While the benefits of peer teaching for learners and faculty are described in detail in the literature, less attention is given to the learning outputs for the student-teachers. This systematic review focuses on the learning outputs for medical undergraduates acting as student-teachers in the last decade (2012-2022).

Aim: Our aim is to describe what learning outputs student-teachers have from peer teaching, and map what research methods are used to assess the outputs. We defined learning outputs in a broad sense, including all types of learning experiences, intended and non-intended, associated with being a peer teacher.

Methods: A literature search was conducted in four electronic databases. Title, abstract and full text were screened by 8 independent reviewers and selection was based on predefined eligibility criteria. We excluded papers not describing structured peer teaching interventions with student-teachers in a formalized role. From the included articles we extracted information about the learning outputs of being a student-teacher as medical undergraduate.

Results: From 668 potential titles, 100 were obtained as full-texts, and 45 selected after close examination, group deliberation, updated search and quality assessment using MERSQI score (average score 10/18). Most articles reported learning outputs using mixed methods (67%). Student-teachers reported an increase in subject-specific learning (62%), pedagogical knowledge and skills (49%), personal outputs (31%) and generic skills (38%). Most articles reported outputs using self-reported data (91%).

Conclusion: Although there are few studies that systematically investigate student-teachers learning outputs, evidence suggests that peer teaching offers learning outputs for the student-teachers and helps them become better physicians. Further research is needed to enhance learning outputs for student-teachers and systematically investigate student-teachers' learning outputs and its impact on student-teachers.

Keywords: medical school; medical student; peer teacher; peer-assisted learning.

Figure 1

Flow chart displaying the whole process of assessing and selecting articles for this review.