Situational Judgement

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How To Prepare For UCAT Situational Judgement

In this section, we will cover what UCAT Situational Judgement entails, and how to effectively answer UCAT Situational Judgement questions.

What is UCAT Situational Judgement?

Situational Judgement is the fifth and final subtest in UCAT.

It assesses your ability to understand real world situations and identify important factors and appropriate responses in dealing with them. Scenarios are usually based in a university or health-related setting, and the main character will normally be a medical or dental student, or junior health professional.

Why is Situational Judgement important in medicine?

Situational Judgement tests are widely used in medicine to evaluate candidates’ professionalism. UCAT Situational Judgement assesses attributes considered important in the study and practice of medicine, including empathy, adaptability, resilience, teamwork and integrity.

What is the structure of UCAT Situational Judgement?

In this UCAT subtest you will be presented with 69 questions within 22 scenarios. Each scenario will be associated with between one and five UCAT questions.

You will have 26 minutes to answer all of the questions, but most students do not find Situational Judgement as time pressured as other UCAT subtests. It is, however, often very difficult to judge which is the ‘correct’ answer.

In UCAT Situational Judgement, you will receive full marks if you choose the correct answer, and partial marks if you choose an option that is close to the correct answer.

What are the types of UCAT Situational Judgement question?

There are three main types of Situational Judgement question.

Importance questions

Less than half of the UCAT Situational Judgement subtest will be composed of Importance questions. In these UCAT questions, you will be presented with a scenario, followed by a number of considerations. You will need to rate the relative importance of each consideration in the context of the scenario, from ‘very important’ to ‘not important at all’.

Example Question - Importance Questions Click Here For Solutions
Situational Judgement SJ1 Question 4 Passage A junior doctor, Brian, has just commenced work on a busy surgical ward. He shares his workload with another junior colleague, John. Brian has noticed that John is consistently late for work. This has been going on for the past fortnight. John being late has resulted in Brian taking on extra responsibilities on the ward to ensure that patients receive appropriate care. How important to take into account are the following considerations for Brian when deciding how to respond to the situation? Question The degree to which Brian and John know each other and whether they have a close working relationship Very important Important Of minor importance Not important at all

Example Question - Importance Questions Click Here For Solutions

Situational Judgement SJ1 Question 4

Passage

A junior doctor, Brian, has just commenced work on a busy surgical ward. He shares his workload with another junior colleague, John. Brian has noticed that John is consistently late for work. This has been going on for the past fortnight. John being late has resulted in Brian taking on extra responsibilities on the ward to ensure that patients receive appropriate care.

How important to take into account are the following considerations for Brian when deciding how to respond to the situation?

Question

The degree to which Brian and John know each other and whether they have a close working relationship

Very important
Important
Of minor importance
Not important at all

Appropriateness questions

The commonest type of question in UCAT Situational Judgement is Appropriateness questions. Here you will be presented with a scenario and a series of actions. You will need to rate the appropriateness of each action from ‘very appropriate’ to ‘very inappropriate’.

A smaller number of questions will provide an exact quote that a character may say based on the scenario, and ask you to rate the appropriateness of each statement.

Example Question - Appropriateness Questions Click Here For Solutions
Situational Judgement SJ3 Question 3 Passage A dental student, George, has been contacted by his supervisor, Dr Jefferson, to arrange a mid-placement review. The purpose of the review is to assess George’s learning portfolio. George has been on a placement at a busy dental clinic, and has not kept up to date with his supervised learning events. Furthermore, George has not completed any of the learning targets he had agreed upon with Dr Jefferson at the start of the rotation. How appropriate are each of the following responses by George in this situation? Question Stay back late after the placement has finished in order to complete the supervised learning events. A very appropriate thing to do Appropriate, but not ideal Inappropriate, but not awful A very inappropriate thing to do

Example Question - Appropriateness Questions Click Here For Solutions

Situational Judgement SJ3 Question 3

Passage

A dental student, George, has been contacted by his supervisor, Dr Jefferson, to arrange a mid-placement review. The purpose of the review is to assess George’s learning portfolio. George has been on a placement at a busy dental clinic, and has not kept up to date with his supervised learning events. Furthermore, George has not completed any of the learning targets he had agreed upon with Dr Jefferson at the start of the rotation.

How appropriate are each of the following responses by George in this situation?

Question

Stay back late after the placement has finished in order to complete the supervised learning events.

A very appropriate thing to do
Appropriate, but not ideal
Inappropriate, but not awful
A very inappropriate thing to do

Most/least appropriateness questions

In this UCAT question type, you are also presented with a scenario. However, you are then given three possible actions or responses directly underneath the scenario. You will need to choose the most and least appropriate response for the given scenario, and ‘drag and drop’ these items accordingly.

Example Question - Most/Least Appropriate Questions Click Here For Solutions
Situational Judgement SJ4

What strategies can I use to answer UCAT Situational Judgement questions?

To effectively answer UCAT Situational Judgement questions, you will need a solid understanding of the principles governing medical professionalism. These include: honesty and integrity, compassionate and patient-centred care, effective teamwork, patient autonomy, confidentiality and a commitment to safety and ongoing improvement. There are a variety of UCAT strategies that can be used for Situational Judgement questions to arrive at the correct answer and maximise your score. These will be covered in detail in the MedEntry UCAT Course.

How should I prepare for UCAT Situational Judgement?

You can test your ability in UCAT Situational Judgement with MedEntry’s free Diagnostic Test. You should develop effective strategies to answer UCAT Situational Judgement questions by attending a UCAT Workshop and using MedEntry’s comprehensive guided curriculum. Practice the strategies by working on the UCAT practice exams, subtest mocks and drills on MedEntry’s UCAT online platform. Use MedEntry’s sophisticated feedback and personalised adaptive learning technology to target your weak areas in the lead up to UCAT test day.