Meaning Making Among Professional Master's Athletic Training Students

Abstract

Context New approaches to education and pedagogy are needed in athletic training education to better support developmental benchmarks that cultivate skills for lifelong learning. Objective Explore and understand students' perceptions of their education and how those perceptions support their development toward self-authorship through the complexity of their meaning making. Design Qualitative, grounded theory. Setting Division I Commission on Accreditation of Athletic Training Education athletic training programs. Patients or Other Participants Twelve participants (9 female, 3 male; age = 24 ± 2 years) in their second year of athletic training education were recruited for the study. Of the 12 participants, 11 were engaged in an immersive clinical experience. Data Collection and Analysis Participants engaged in a semistructured video conference interview. Data were analyzed using grounded theory approach to understand the complexity of students' ways of making meaning cognitively, intrapersonally, and interpersonally. Data saturation, peer review, member checks, and theoretical triangulation were used to establish credibility. Results Participants exhibited meaning making in 2 distinct ways: (1) external guidance and (2) movement toward internal guidance. The categories were further broken down by theme. Placing responsibility for knowledge on authorities, need for step-by-step guidance, and seeking approval marked the themes of external guidance. Building confidence and role identity development marked themes of movement toward internal guidance. Conclusions Participants who were reliant on external guidance required external authorities for knowledge acquisition and learning. Some participants demonstrated deeper meaning making when discussing their experiences with clinical education.