The words to use
- Intelligent layperson's view
- The MSC's phrase for what interviewers expect on medical topics in the news: an informed, sensible understanding, not specialist knowledge.
- Confounding
- When a third factor is linked to both the exposure and the outcome, it distorts the link between them. Stress could drive both late-night phone use and poor sleep.
- Cross-sectional study
- A study that measures everything at one point in time, such as a single survey. It can show a link, but not which came first.
- Limitation
- A weakness in a study's design that limits what it can conclude. Name the mechanism, such as confounding or self-report, not just "small sample".
- EPQ
- The Extended Project Qualification: a project in which you choose your own question, research it and present what you found. Interviewers ask because it is close to real research.
