Event summary

This paper studies the development of patient-regarding altruistic preferences in the course of the medicine studies. For this purpose, we present structural estimates on experimental data from a large sample of medical students varying in their study progresses. The estimates reveal substantial heterogeneity in altruistic preferences across study cohorts. Patient-regarding altruism is highest for freshmen, declines for the pre-clinical and clinical cohorts, and tends to increase for junior residents (practical year). Across individuals, patient-regarding altruistic preferences vary with gender and general altruism. Variation in patient-regarding altruism is also correlated with medical students’ occupational choices such as expected specialty choices and preferred residency location.