Digital Evaluation of Undergraduates’ Knowledge about Scientific Research in Databases during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

Background: COVID-19 pandemic times forced health education to go online, and, due to this necessity, long-term difficulties in education such as bibliographic search in databases like PubMed might have worsened even when platforms such as PubMed provide helping mechanisms to the user. These difficulties or even complete lack of knowledge are, unfortunately, not well documented in the literature. Therefore, this study aimed to describe doubts, lack of knowledge and questions of researchers regarding bibliographic research in PubMed as well as to solve all of those doubts by developing a didactic e-book in relation to bibliographic research in PubMed. Methods: This cross-sectional and populational-based study was conducted between January and April 2021. In northern Brazil, a total of 105 dentistry undergraduate students (DUS) received an anonymous digital form (Google® Forms Platform) using a non-probabilistic “snowball” sampling technique. The digital form was composed of four blocks of dichotomous and multiple-choice questions. After signing the informed consent term, the DUS were divided into three groups according to their period/semester in the dentistry program during the study time (G1: 1st period/semester; G2: 5th period/semester and G3: 10th period/semester). A total of 25 questions referring to demographic, educational and knowledge data about how to do scientific research and how to use bibliographic search in PubMed were asked, and all data were presented as descriptive percentages and then analyzed using the Chi square and G tests. Results: From 105 (100%), G1 had 29/105 (27.6%); G2 had 37/105 (35.2%); G3 had 39/105 (37.2%), the average age was 22.34 years and most participants were female 85/105 (81%). Among our sample, 56/105 (53.4%) had not used any type of search strategy, and 96/105 (91.4%) used database research methods. The main database for literature search used was Scielo 92/105 (87.6%), and 63/105 (60%) had general questions or doubts about bibliographic research. All these data had statistical significance p < 0.0001. Conclusions: The results demonstrate a lack of knowledge and doubts in DUS from three different periods/semesters, and this collected information can help in the formation of didactic material to solve such doubts.