Relationship between Reflective Practice Skills and Volume of Writing in a Reflective Journal

Abstract

Background: According to the diversification of the health needs and the expansion of health disparities, public health nurses need to improve their practical capabilities, starting from basic education in graduate and undergraduate courses. And Reflective Practice with using reflective journal is one way of improving practical capabilities. The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between the volume of reflective journal and the quality of progress in the reflective cycle. Methods: The participants in this study were 20 junior students majoring in public health nursing (hereinafter "PHN students") at a university in the Chugoku area, Japan. We asked the participants to answer the questions on Reflective Practice Skills (RPS) composed of six criteria corresponding to the six questions of Gibbs on the reflective cycle before and after they started writing RJ. The volume of reflective writing was measured by the number of characters written by the PHN students in RJ of the reflective practice for three months. The study plan was approved by the Ethics Committee for Nursing Study, Okayama University. Results: Although the average total RPS score showed a change of about 3 points as a result of the 3-month RJ writing exercise, no correlation was observed between the RPS score and the RJ writing volume (r = 0.175). However, we did observe a moderately positive correlation between the RPS score and the RJ writing volume with regard to Items 5 and 6 (r = 0.475 and r = 0.444, respectively). Conclusion: This study indicated that detailed RJ writing helps to complete the reflective cycle all the way to theorization and action planning, and that the volume of writing may serve as a criterion for qualitative evaluation.

Master of nursing specialist experiences of an internship through the use of written reflections: A qualitative research study

“…Although the clinical practice settings described by participants varied, possibly due to the study’s use of Gibbs’s reflective cycle, the study found that reflection was seen as beneficial for participants' feelings, thoughts, and actions [ [18] , [19] , [20] ]. Participants felt it was meant to reflect on events in clinical practice to help them do things the next time they faced a similar situation [ 20 ].…”

“…Although the clinical practice settings described by participants varied, possibly due to the study’s use of Gibbs’s reflective cycle, the study found that reflection was seen as beneficial for participants' feelings, thoughts, and actions [ [18] , [19] , [20] ]. Participants felt it was meant to reflect on events in clinical practice to help them do things the next time they faced a similar situation [ 20 ]. Generally, for MNS, it is not only necessary to master solid clinical expertise but also to learn the ability to communicate and feedback information [ 33 ] so that learn to reduce the impact of adverse events on personal emotions and to think about clinical events more positive and mature way [ 34 ].…”

“…Based on Gibbs’s reflective cycle, reflective practice has been successfully performed in some countries, such as Japan’s public health graduate and undergraduate students [ 19 , 20 ] and nursing staff in China [ 21 ]. The study found that MNS in China must have the ability to enhance personal reflection and professional ability [ 7 , 8 ], and Gibb’s reflective cycle can be used as a theoretical framework for beginning writers to reflect on their behavior, to improve their performance [ 16 , 17 ].…”

Reflective Practice on Social Loafing in College-Level Group Projects

“…To create high-quality expertise in managing in my classes, I found it necessary to follow a developing the required expertise before moving from one step to the next (Tanaka et al, 2018).…”