Nurses' Attitudes Toward Continuing Formal Education:A Comparison by Level of Education and Geography

Abstract

The education of nurses has an influence on patient safety and outcomes, the nursing shortage, the faculty shortage, and nurses' attitudes and actions. This article reports on a dissertation study designed to examine the attitudes of nurses, initially registered with an associate degree or diploma in nursing, toward continuing formal education. Actively licensed registered nurses in the eastern and western United States (n=535) participated. The main finding of this study was that, although nurses held positive attitudes overall, attitudes ranked barely above neutral. The findings suggest that work needs to be done to improve nurses' attitudes toward continuing formal education and research needs to be undertaken to understand what would entice nurses back to school. Implications for nursing practice and education are discussed along with suggestions for future research.

Exploring registered nurses’ attitudes to postgraduate education for specialty practice in Australia

“…They tend to attribute failure to insufficient effort or deficiencies in knowledge and skills. The responses from the participants in this study support prior research in indicating that having good support from a spouse, partner, employer and/or peers, in the form of finance, time and moral support can greatly increase the likelihood of completing their postgraduate studies (Altmann, 2012;Carpenter & Hudacek, 1996;Hassouneh-Phillips & Beckett, 2003;Lent, Brown, & Hackett, 1994;Plunkett et al, 2010).…”

“…Personal and professional values and attitudes are often reflected in an individual's behaviour and motives for action (Altmann, 2012). Attitude plays a significant role in motivation because attitude influences a person's ability to question life's complexities or underlying assumptions in specific situations (Altmann, 2012).…”

“…Attitude plays a significant role in motivation because attitude influences a person's ability to question life's complexities or underlying assumptions in specific situations (Altmann, 2012). Attitudes and motives are linked to actions: a strong attitude can motivate one to participate (Altmann, 2011;Henerson, Morris, & Fitz-Gibbon, 1987;Lethbridge, 1989).…”

“…This option is tested by the decision to return to study, which means forgoing extra work hours and income while also placing a financial impost on the family budget because of university fees. According to Altmann (2012), many nurses are the family's sole financial provider and they would much prefer a timely entrance into the workforce to avoid adding financial burden to the family.…”

“…However, few universities in Australia offer Commonwealth-supported places at the postgraduate level because most are fee-paying courses. Many of the nurses in this study prefer to enter the workforce upon completing their undergraduate degree and do not want to contemplate extra financial burden by pursuing postgraduate (Altmann, 2012). Even though all permanent full-time registered nurses working for Queensland Health are provided a 3.5%…”