NURSING INSTRUCTOR EXPERIENCES SUPPORTING STUDENT RESILIENCE

Abstract

Undergraduate nursing students identified their clinical practice education as a significant stressor. Students who cannot cope with stress experience poorer academic performance and well-being. Resilience is a personal quality and/or process that enables one to cope successfully after facing difficulties. Although nursing clinical instructors (NCIs) have a major influence on students’ clinical learning, there is minimal research on NCIs’ experiences fostering student resilience. This study aimed to describe and understand undergraduate NCIs’ experiences supporting nursing student resilience development during their clinical practice education. A qualitative descriptive design was adopted, and semi-structured interviews were used with nine undergraduate NCIs from a Southwestern Ontario university. Conventional content data analysis was used to analyze the findings. Two themes emerged about participants’ perceptions of resilience: (a) resilience is a process of moving forward from challenges, and (b) the indicators of student resilience development include having the ability to cope, feelings of self-confidence, and being self-directed to learn. Three themes were also generated concerning participants’ experiences of supporting student resilience-building. Participants described (a) providing active guidance to students, (b) building supportive teaching environments to foster student resilience, and (c) having uncertainties about resilience development strategies. Participants identified various factors related to NCIs, students, environment, and curriculum that influence student resilience-building. This study highlighted NCIs’ experiences supporting student resilience development during their clinical practice education. The findings can inform NCI professional development education strategies, nursing education-related policies, and future nursing research about fostering student resilience-building.