How bad is social awkwardness in med school interviews/medicine in general?
Basically, I have Asperger's which causes me to be socially awkward at times and have a lot of anxiety and a lack of confidence. I am wondering how this will impact future medical school interviews. During interviews, I am always friendly and polite, but my answers often sound slightly robotic and are not delivered in a very polished manner. Are medical schools willing to overlook some social awkwardness in the interview if the applicant is qualified in other ways? For reference, my major was in Electrical Engineering (3.9 total GPA; 4.0 BCPM), and my MCAT is 522. I am doing research in MRI imaging with hopefully one paper published end of this year. Next year, I will be doing my one-year master's in EE and doing clinical hours as a scribe.
More importantly, does medicine as a whole even tolerate people with social awkwardness/neurodivergence? My plan for the future would be to either go into neurology, radiology, or rheumatology. I would appreciate hearing from others who have successfully learned to overcome their social awkwardness in medicine.
Also, the reason I want to do medicine in the first place instead of just engineering is that I had a month-long hospital stay in my freshman year of college where I was diagnosed with a connective tissue disease, which inspired me to help others navigating medical issues.
Posted Jun 13, 2026, 5:29 PM UTC