Anxiety and Spiritual Well-Being in Nursing Students: A Cross-Sectional Study

Abstract

Purpose: To analyze the relation between anxiety and spiritual well-being in undergraduate nursing students. Design: Cross sectional, correlational, and survey design. Method: A total of 169 students from a Brazilian Nursing School completed three instruments: demographic data, Spiritual Well-Being Scale (SWBS), and Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI). Findings: The mean score of SWBS was high, and the mean score of BAI was low. When experiencing anxiety, there was lower probability of experiencing high spiritual well-being. For those students considering religiosity very important, the score of SWBS was high. Students scoring lower in SWBS had more probability of experiencing moderate/high anxiety. Conclusions: Higher scores of SWBS and importance given to religiosity were related to lower scores of BAI. Also, the performance and score of spiritual well-being were related to anxiety scores. Further research is worthy to identify and validate which educational aspects could promote spiritual well-being and reduce anxiety as well as research to analyze the relation between spiritual well-being score and learning outcomes.