How to answer “Tell me about your research” in a medical school interview

A strong answer to "tell me about your research" in a medical school interview explains the question your project set out to answer in words a listener outside your field can understand. It says exactly what you did, and it is honest about what you understood and what you didn't. The interviewer may never have worked in your area, so clarity counts as much as the science.

What the interviewer is assessing

• Critical thinking
• Communication
• Self-reflection and growth

The interviewer wants to know whether you understood the project or only ran its protocol. They listen for the research question and why it mattered, for the method in plain terms, for your own part separated from the lab's, and for the result, including a negative one. They also judge how you explain technical work to a non-specialist, because that is the skill you'll need with patients. An applicant who can say "I don't know" about a part of the project they didn't run sounds more credible than one who claims the whole project.

In a panel interview, a physician-scientist on the panel may probe the method deeply, while a clinician tests whether the explanation makes sense. In an MMI, research comes up less often, but a personal station or a station on evidence can bring it in.

How to structure your answer

1. State the question the project tried to answer in one plain sentence, and say why the answer matters.
2. Explain the approach in two or three sentences, defining each technical term the moment you use it.
3. Say what you did yourself, and separate it from what your supervisor, a graduate student or the rest of the lab did.
4. Give the result, including a negative or incomplete one, and say what it means for the original question.
5. Describe one problem you ran into and how you handled it.
6. Close with what the work taught you about how evidence is made, and how that changes the way you'll read a clinical study.

Prepare two versions: a ninety-second one for a clinician and a longer one for a scientist who asks follow-ups. Reread your own abstract or poster and the two or three papers your project built on, because interviewers ask about the background as often as the method. If your role was small, say so. A precise account of one assay beats a vague claim to a whole project, and interviewers test vague claims.

Common mistakes

• Opening with the title of the paper and the name of the technique loses a listener outside your field in the first sentence.
• Claiming the project's conclusions as your own when you ran one experiment invites a follow-up you can't answer, and interviewers ask it.
• Describing only what you did, with no account of why the question mattered, suggests you followed instructions without understanding them.
• Skipping the result because it was negative or inconclusive misses the chance to show you know what a result means.
• Spending the whole three minutes on method leaves no time for the reflection the question asked for.

Follow-up questions to prepare for

• What were the limitations of your study, and how would you address them if you repeated it?
• Why did your lab choose that method rather than another?
• What would you have done differently if you had been leading the project?
• How does your research experience change the way you read a clinical study?
• Do you plan to continue doing research during medical school and after?