Predictors of psychological distress amongst nursing students: A multicenter cross-sectional study

Abstract

Undergraduate nursing students show high-stress levels. In students, stress has been linked to adverse physical and psychological health outcomes and academic and clinical demands. To date, there are few studies dealing with psychological predictors of stress amongst nursing students. This study aimed to assess psychological distress in a sample of Italian nursing students and to explore its relationship with sociodemographic and psychological factors, specifically dispositional mindfulness, emotional regulation difficulties, and empathy. A multicenter cross-sectional survey design was employed. Participants were recruited from five teaching hospitals associated with a public university in northern Italy. A sample of 622 undergraduate nursing students was recruited.Participants were recruited on campus and completed a paper-and-pencil survey. More than 70% of nursing students reported meaningful levels of psychological distress. Students with higher dispositional mindfulness scores had lower psychological distress, whereas emotional regulation difficulties and empathic personal distress were positively associated with perceived stress. No gender differences were found in stress levels, but senior students showed lower psychological distress than more junior students. Interventions aimed at increasing mindfulness facets and improving emotional regulation strategies may help to reduce perceived psychological stress in nursing students.

The Relationship between Mindfulness and Emotional Intelligence as a Protective Factor for Healthcare Professionals: Systematic Review

“…Table 2 gathers the main findings of the reviewed studies related to this review's objective [50][51][52][53][54][55][56][57][58][59].…”

Perceived stress factors among newcomers to the nursing career

“…Los resultados mostraron que de entre los factores que componen el cuestionario de estrés percibido por el alumnado novel, el más estresante es el estrés académico. Estos resultados coinciden con los encontrados en otros estudios (13,22) que indicaron como estresores académicos más importantes el temor a la evaluación y el miedo al fracaso en los exámenes En este sentido, autores como Brosschot et al ( 9), Salavarani et al (12) y Cabanach et al (13) destacan la sobrecarga académica, como un factor muy importante para que el alumnado presente estrés al igual que los estudiantes de nuestro estudio.…”

“…En el análisis de las relaciones de estrés con las características del alumnado, este estudio revela de manera significativa que las mujeres presentan una vulnerabilidad al estrés mayor que los hombres, La obtención de estas diferencias en la percepción del grado de estrés con respecto al sexo, concuerda con las conclusiones de autores como Salvarani et al (12) y Rayan (4), quienes señalan que las alumnas de enfermería presentan más estrés que los alumnos, indicando que estos resultados pueden atribuirse a que los hombres son menos expresivos en sus preocupaciones.…”

“…Resulta importante señalar que existen pruebas científicas significativas de que los estudiantes de enfermería sufren mayores niveles de estrés que los estudiantes de otras carreras, como medicina, trabajo social o farmacia (3). Salavarani et al (12) destacan la excesiva carga de trabajo como uno de los principales factores de estrés entre el alumnado de enfermería. En la misma línea, Cabanach et al (13) concluyen que los elementos de preocupación más frecuentes entre los estudiantes de enfermería son el estrés académico, la carga de trabajo, los exámenes y el miedo al fracaso y rendimiento académico.…”

Personal values as early predictors of emotional and cognitive empathy among medical students

“…In the healthcare context, empathy has been studied in depth also because of its association with improvements in clinical outcomes (Canale et al, 2012;Hojat et al, 2011;Putrino, Tabullo, Mesurado, & de Minzi, 2018), patient satisfaction (Roter et al, 1997), patients' adherence to treatment (Kim, Kaplowitz, & Johnston, 2004), and patientcenteredness in undergraduate medical students (Ardenghi et al, 2019). Moreover, empathy is a protective factor against high psychological distress in medical students (Strepparava et al, 2017b), healthcare professionals (Salvarani et al, 2019), and healthcare students (Salvarani et al, 2020), being inversely correlated with burnout (Brazeau, Schroeder, Rovi, & Boyd, 2010;Hojat, Vergare, Isenberg, Cohen, & Spandorfer, 2015). Given this international clinical evidence, there is a growing interest in identifying the teaching strategies (Koblar, Cranwell, Koblar, Carnell, & Galletly, 2017) and the psycho-attitudinal variables, such as attachment style (Ardenghi, Rampoldi, Bani, & Strepparava, 2020a), dispositional mindfulness (Ardenghi et al, 2020b), personality (Hojat et al, 2005), and quality of life (Paro et al, 2014), that could help medical students increase empathy during their time at medical school.…”