Nursing Students' Mindsets Matter: Cultivating a Growth Mindset

Achievement Goal Theory and Mindsets: Keys for Competency Development in Nursing

BACKGROUND

Many nursing schools are transitioning to a competency-based model due to the increasing complexity of medical information, skills, task acuities, and cognitive overload.

PROBLEM

Nursing faculty may not be familiar with the synergy between achievement goal theory and the growth mindset (GM) model to prepare nursing students within a competency-based model effectively.

APPROACH

This article presents a persuasive argument for how integrating achievement goal theory and the GM model could effectively foster mastery goals essential for competency development.

CONCLUSIONS

Mastery goals, a component of the GM model, can be used as tangible indicators for assessing and evaluating competency development.

The Intersection of Growth Mindset and Accreditation in Pharmacy Education

OBJECTIVES

To describe existing growth mindset literature within pharmacy and health care education, describe how a growth mindset can be beneficial in the accreditation process, and propose potential ways to promote a growth mindset in faculty, preceptors, students, and staff within pharmacy education.

FINDINGS

To help pharmacy learners develop a growth mindset, existing literature emphasizes the need for a shift toward and aligning assessment with a growth mindset, helping to create self-directed adaptive learners, leading to health care providers who can adjust their practice to tackle expected and unexpected challenges throughout their careers. Strategies to create a culture of growth mindset identified include training faculty and learners on growth mindset and developing new assessments that track a learner's growth. Recommendations for pharmacy educators include encouraging educators to assess their own growth mindset and use a variety of teaching methods and provide feedback on learner effort that encourages the process of learning rather than focusing on individual attributes, traits, and results.

SUMMARY

Growth mindset intersects with accreditation standards for both professional degree programs and providers of continuing pharmacy education. Continuing professional development process is one way to encourage faculty, staff, and students to develop a growth mindset. While a growth mindset can have many positive impacts on pharmacy accreditation, it is essential to recognize that achieving and maintaining accreditation is a multifaceted process involving numerous factors. A growth mindset can positively influence pharmacy education accreditation by fostering a culture of continuous improvement, innovation, resilience, student-centeredness, data-driven decision-making, collaboration, and effective leadership.

Design health care systems to protect resilience in nursing

This panel paper is the fourth installment in a six-part Nursing Outlook special edition based on the 2022 Emory Business Case for Nursing Summit. The 2022 summit was led by Emory School of Nursing in partnership with Emory School of Business. It convened national nursing, health care, and business leaders to explore possible solutions to nursing workforce crises, including the nursing shortage. Each of the summit's four panels authored a paper in this special edition on their respective topic(s) of discussion, and this panel paper is focused on resilience in nursing. It addresses the importance of organizational culture in nursing retention, the role of leadership in reducing nurse turnover, and strategies for how to build resilience systems that counteract or eliminate sources of moral distress. Cost rationales are discussed as part of 'the busienss case' for investing in resilience systems.

Grit as a Predictor of Academic Success Among Associate Degree Nursing Students

AIM

The purpose of this study was to explore whether grit is a predictor of success in associate degree nursing (ADN) programs.

BACKGROUND

A question that challenges admission decision-making in nursing programs is "Who will succeed?" This question is particularly relevant in ADN programs, which often have higher attrition rates than baccalaureate programs.

METHOD

This longitudinal, mixed-methods study was conducted with 451 ADN students across nine programs, including interviews with seven unsuccessful students and nine successful students.

RESULTS

Short Grit Scale scores were not found to be statistically significant as a predictor of academic success; however, themes that emerged from the interviews do align with the theory of grit.

CONCLUSION

Further research is needed to explore whether recognizing the level of grit in students during admission processes would help identify students who are likely to succeed.

Spotlight on noncognitive skills: Views from nursing students and educators

BACKGROUND

Noncognitive skills have a considerable role in influencing nursing students' performance in clinical and educational settings. Understanding how nursing students and educators perceive noncognitive skills is important given the broad classifications of noncognitive competencies.

OBJECTIVE

This study sought to examine nursing students' and educators' perception of noncognitive skills.

DESIGN

This study adopted a descriptive qualitative approach.

SETTING

This study was conducted virtually via Zoom in one university in Singapore.

PARTICIPANTS

Purposive sampling through a maximum variation technique was used to select 35 nursing students and 12 educators.

METHODS

Semistructured interviews were conducted through eight virtual face-to-face focus group discussions. Interviews were audio- and videorecorded and transcribed verbatim. Data were analysed through thematic analysis.

RESULTS

The participants stated that individual and interpersonal skills contribute to one's noncognitive skills. Two themes emerged from the participants' narratives: (1) the ability to manage oneself and (2) social interactions with others. The first theme describes the various individual characteristics such as growth mindset, adaptability, resilience, and emotional regulation. The second theme describes the importance of empathy and meaningful relationships as types of non-cognitive skills.

CONCLUSIONS

The findings of this study provide the basis for the development of noncognitive assessment tools by educators. In addition, they pave the foundation for the curation of future programs that promote the noncognitive skills of nursing students. Hospital-based educators may use these findings to curate suitable programs for improving the noncognitive abilities of nurses.

A review to characterise and map the growth mindset theory in health professions education

INTRODUCTION

Growth mindset is a motivation theory proposed by Carol Dweck that posits our beliefs about intelligence, and the ability to change mindsets can have impacts on how we approach challenges, respond to criticism challenges and orient our goals. This study characterised articles on growth mindset theory in health professions education to: summarise the aspects of growth mindset being researched, describe the discussed benefits of growth mindset theory and outline strategies discussed that may promote a growth mindset.

METHODS

A systematic review of the literature yielded 4927 articles-articles were reviewed and excluded if they were outside of health professions education and did not discuss Dweck's growth mindset theory. The final review yielded 14 research articles and 13 commentaries, which were characterised and analysed using content analysis.

RESULTS

The included articles were published in 2016 and beyond; the articles represented a diverse context, participant type and approach. Most research studies measured participant mindsets and evaluated the correlation with other variables (eg grit, well-being, anxiety). Articles often highlighted benefits and strategies to promote a growth mindset at the learner, educator and organisation level. The most common learner benefits were to help them be more receptive to feedback as well as increased resiliency and perseverance, educator benefits focused on supporting collaborative relationships and safe learning environments. The most prevalent strategies discussed were teaching learners about growth mindset theory, shifting faculty feedback to emphasise effort and to prioritise feedback across the organisation.

CONCLUSION

The growth mindset framework has been shown in other fields to help others manage educational challenges and enhance learning environments. Researchers are encouraged to explore how interventions such as teaching about and prioritising a growth mindset can support learners, health care professionals, educators and organisations.