The influence of experienced violence and the clinical learning environment on vocational identity in nursing students

Abstract

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to determine the influence of the learning environment on nursing students' clinical practice education and the violence experienced during clinical practice on vocational identity. Methods: The design of the study was a descriptive survey, and data were collected from November 15 to November 27, 2019. The data of the study were obtained from 515 nursing students attending three universities using self-administered questionnaires. Data were analyzed using the SPSS 25.0 program. Results: For the experience of violence, verbal violence (98.3%) was the type most commonly experienced, and patients (97.7%) were the most frequent perpetrators. The clinical learning environment was perceived differently according to gender, personality, interpersonal relationship, satisfaction with nursing, clinical practice satisfaction, violence prevention education, the need for violence prevention education, sexual violence experiences, and violent perpetrators. The most influential factor on vocational identity was satisfaction with the nursing major (β=0.24, p<.001), followed by extroverted personality (β=0.18, p<.001), clinical learning environment (β=0.15, p=.001), satisfaction with clinical practice (β =0.15, p=.002), and the experience of violence by patients (β=-0.10, p=.016), which together explained 24.1% of the variance in the model. Conclusion: It is necessary to make efforts to ensure that students do not experience violence during clinical practice, to maintain a close cooperative relationship between university and clinical institutions to improve the learning environment for clinical practice, and to make the clinical field an educational learning environment.