The Effects of Low-Fidelity Simulation on Students' Perceived Abilities to Build Therapeutic Relationships

Abstract

Background: The combination of nursing student anxiety toward patients with mental health conditions, along with their unpreparedness for exercising active listening, empathy, and self-awareness in clinical situations, creates a barrier to achieving therapeutic nurse– patient relationships. Method: A quantitative quasiexperimental study with a one-group pretest-posttest design was used to determine whether a low-fidelity communication simulation laboratory would decrease nursing students' perceived anxiety levels toward mental health patients and increase students' perceived empathy, self-awareness, and active listening levels. Results: After completing the communication simulation laboratory, students' anxiety decreased significantly ( p < .001) and active listening increased significantly ( p < .001); empathy and self-awareness levels were relatively unchanged. Conclusion: Using a communication simulation laboratory effectively decreased nursing students' perceived anxiety levels toward patients and improved their perceived active listening skills. The findings of the study support the use of low-fidelity simulations to prepare students for psychiatric nursing clinical practice. [ J Nurs Educ . 2023;62(10):575–579.]