A systematic review of nurse‐related social network analysis studies

Abstract

This analytical approach is relatively new in the field of nursing but does show considerable promise in offering insights into the way information flows between individuals, teams, institutions and other structures. An understanding of these structures provides a means of improving communication.

Nurse and midwife researcher collaboration in eastern sub‐Saharan Africa: a social network analysis

“…We performed a SNA to better understand the collaboration network of sub‐Saharan clinical nursing and midwifery researchers, with the assumption that increased understanding of how individuals are linked will support efforts to strengthen regional research capacity. This is the first SNA to assess the collaboration of nurse and midwife researchers in southern and eastern African countries (Benton & Fernández, ; Benton et al, ). The findings that nurses are poorly connected are similar to a previous analysis of international nursing researchers from all over the world (Benton & Ferguson, ).…”

Sustaining a Global Social Network: a quasi‐experimental study

“…The intent of these requests have focused on maximizing the capacity and capability of individuals who seek to deliver change in increasingly complex and dynamic environments (Benton ; Benton et al. ; Pow et al. ).…”

“…However, as Benton et al. () noted, although the number of research studies seeking to understand the role of networks in nursing has increased in recent times, there is still much work to be done. In short, this study sought to address the lack of studies that have examined network architecture within a group over time.…”

“…Certainly the use of social network analysis by nurse researchers and for investigating topics where nurses are involved has increased markedly over the past two decades (Benton et al. ). However, as noted in the systematic review by the same authors, the majority of these studies which come from North America tend to focus on the descriptions of the network's structure at a single point in time, and are focused on team or group interactions at a local level.…”

Developing an Instrument to Understand the Social-Structural Integration of Diverse Students

“…Social networks have the ability to ascend formal boundaries of a classroom, department, college, or geographic region. 32,40,41,[47][48][49] Determining the boundary conditions is a crucial first step, in implementing SNA. There are natural choices in engineering education such as a class or classroom.…”