As mental health nursing roles expand, is education expanding mental health nurses? an emotionally intelligent view towards preparation for psychological therapies and relatedness

Emotionally intelligent strategies students use to manage challenging interactions with patients and families: A qualitative inquiry

Healthcare students experience elevated stress associated with the interpersonal work of clinical practice. Emotional labour involves clinicians' use of intra- and inter-personal skills to manage their emotional states and promote patient and family emotional wellbeing. Effective emotional labour requires emotionally-intelligent skills. Learning to use these skills is critical to students' effective interpersonal management of stressful practice situations however, understanding of emotionally-intelligent strategies used by students on clinical placement is limited. To address this gap in knowledge, a qualitative study was conducted to investigate challenging interpersonal situations with patients and family experienced by pre-registration nursing and pharmacy students during clinical placement, and to identify how they used emotionally intelligent behaviours to manage those situations. Twenty final-year students from an Australian university were interviewed. Interpersonal situations experienced as challenging, involved patients or family members who were angry and aggressive, distressed, or embarrassed. Students used a broad range of cognitive, emotional, relational, and behavioural (CERB) emotionally-intelligent strategies to manage their own and others' emotions and behaviours during these encounters. The CERB framework, derived from analysis of student strategies, is a useful resource for healthcare curricula to support emotional intelligence education for interpersonal skill development and building of empathy and resilience for clinical practice.

Qualitative analysis of ward staff experiences during research of a novel suicide-prevention psychological therapy for psychiatric inpatients: Understanding the barriers and facilitators

BACKGROUND

Suicide prevention is a global priority. Psychiatric hospitalization presents an opportunity to intervene positively with, for example, psychological therapies. However, evidenced-based suicide-prevention psychological treatments are rarely available on in-patient wards. Understanding staff engagement with research investigating suicide-prevention psychological treatments is crucial for their effective, efficacious, and pragmatic implementation. A pilot randomised control trial and feasibility study of Cognitive Behavioural Suicide Prevention therapy provided the opportunity for a qualitative investigation of staff experiences and views of a psychological intervention for people with suicidal experiences on psychiatric in-patient wards.

AIMS

To investigate staff acceptability of Cognitive Behavioural Suicide Prevention therapy for psychiatric inpatients based on their perceptions of their experiences during the conduct of a clinical trial.

METHOD

Transcribed audio-recordings of qualitative interviews and a focus group (n = 19) of purposively sampled staff from eight psychiatric wards were analysed using inductive Thematic Analysis.

RESULTS

Facilitators and barriers were identified for: i) the conduct of the research, and, ii) the suicide-prevention intervention (Cognitive Behavioural Suicide Prevention therapy). Research-related barriers comprised communication difficulties between staff and researchers, and increased staff workload. Research-related facilitators included effective staff/researcher relationships, and alignment of the intervention with organisational goals. Suicide-prevention intervention-related barriers comprised staffs' negative beliefs about suicide which impacted on their referral of inpatients to the clinical trial, and staff perceptions of insufficient information and unfulfilled expectations for involvement in the therapy. Facilitators included staff beliefs that the therapy was beneficial for inpatients, the service and their own clinical practice.

CONCLUSIONS

Staff beliefs that 'suicide-talk' could precipitate suicidal behaviour resulted in covert gatekeeping and restricted referral of only inpatients judged as stable or likely to engage in therapy, which may not be those who could most benefit. Such threats to sample representativeness have implications for future therapy research design. The findings provide novel information for researchers and practitioners regarding the conduct of psychological treatment and research in psychiatric units.

Emotional intelligence and perceived stress of Australian pre-registration healthcare students: A multi-disciplinary cross-sectional study

BACKGROUND

Healthcare students can experience high levels of stress. Emotional intelligence can moderate stress and increase wellbeing however there has been no prior research on the relationship between emotional intelligence and stress in Australian healthcare students.

OBJECTIVES

To measure emotional intelligence (EI) and perceived stress (PS) in final year healthcare students (nursing, pharmacy and dentistry), and to explore the relationships between EI, PS and discipline.

DESIGN AND SETTING

A cross sectional survey of pre-registration healthcare students at a metropolitan university in Australia.

PARTICIPANTS

203 pre-registration final year healthcare students (n = 58 nursing; n = 112 pharmacy; n = 34 dentistry).

METHODS

Emotional Intelligence was measured using the GENOS Emotional Intelligence Inventory (Concise Version) and stress was measured using the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS).

RESULTS

A significant negative correlation was found between EI and PS in nursing and pharmacy students. No difference was found in EI across disciplines. Mean EI scores were lower than normative means. PS was significantly higher than the normative mean for pharmacy and dentistry students and higher than nursing students.

CONCLUSIONS

Emotional intelligence can have a protective effect against stress for healthcare students and can be increased via targeted educational interventions. To support student wellbeing there is a clear need for pre-registration healthcare curricula to include educational components on strengthening EI.

Linking the emotional maturity factors and self-disclosure: a study of Indian organizations

Purpose

This paper aims to discuss a survey, carried out by the authors, of 256 employees employed in public and private manufacturing organizations in north India, to determine if emotional maturity factors have positive association with self-disclosure in the Indian context. Specifically, capitalization and social exchange theories support as major theoretical framework to examine the proposed relationship.

Design/methodology/approach

The sample data used were collected through a cross-sectional survey-based research design and a convenience sampling method. Totally, 290 questionnaires were distributed during office hours, administered with a paper and pencil survey. However, in the final analysis, only 256 responses were considered for analysis using multiple hierarchical regression analysis.

Findings

Results reveal that all dimensions of emotional maturity positively associated with self-disclosure. This study fully supports the applicability of capitalization and social exchange theories while explaining the proposed relationships in Indian context.

Research limitations/implications

The present study used a cross-sectional survey-based research design; future studies may use longitudinal research design.

Practical implications

The study shows how to develop collective work culture and supportive work climate through emotional maturity and self-disclosure. Thus, employees become accustomed to multicultural team and cultural diversity issues at the workplace. The study also recommended that the organized employees social gathering will create positive feeling, and that such feelings of belonging to a group among employees will give reasons for self-disclosure and finally, in turn, to employee effectiveness.

Originality/value

More predominantly, the proposed association has not been examined before and the findings serve as a potential policy guideline for the self-disclosure literature through the perspective of capitalization and social exchange theories in understudied non-US cultures such as India.

Exploring an Emotional Intelligence Model With Psychiatric Mental Health Nurses

BACKGROUND

A lack of emotional skills may affect a nurse's personal well-being and have negative effects on patient outcomes.

OBJECTIVE

To compare psychiatric-mental health nurses' (PMHN) scores on the Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test (MSCEIT) to a normed population and compare the emotional intelligence (EI) scores of PMHNs using two tools, MSCEIT and Self-Rated Emotional Intelligence Scale (SREIS).

DESIGN

Comparative descriptive and correlational study.

RESULTS

PMHNs in the study had a higher mean EI compared with that of 5,000 participants in the normed MSCEIT sample. Significant weak correlations were seen between the perceiving and understanding emotion branches of the MSCEIT and SREIS.

CONCLUSION

The current study added data about a sample of PMHN's EI levels in the United States, which may encourage dialog about EI among PMHNs. Future research is needed to examine the relationship between self-report EI tools (e.g., SREIS) and performance tools (e.g., MSCEIT) to determine if they are measuring the same construct.

Emotional intelligence education in pre-registration nursing programmes: an integrative review

OBJECTIVE

To investigate the state of knowledge on emotional intelligence (EI) education in pre-registration nursing programmes.

DESIGN

Integrative literature review.

DATA SOURCES

CINAHL, Medline, Scopus, ERIC, and Web of Knowledge electronic databases were searched for abstracts published in English between 1992-2014.

REVIEW METHODS

Data extraction and constant comparative analysis of 17 articles.

RESULTS

Three categories were identified: Constructs of emotional intelligence; emotional intelligence curricula components; and strategies for emotional intelligence education.

CONCLUSIONS

A wide range of emotional intelligence constructs were found, with a predominance of trait-based constructs. A variety of strategies to enhance students' emotional intelligence skills were identified, but limited curricula components and frameworks reported in the literature. An ability-based model for curricula and learning and teaching approaches is recommended.

The overall impact of emotional intelligence on nursing students and nursing

Healthcare employers often criticize the lack of emotional competency and critical thinking skills demonstrated by newly licensed nurses. The purpose of this study was to evaluate whether emotional intelligence (EI) training for nurses improves critical thinking and emotional competence enough to justify including EI in nursing curricula. A meta-analysis was conducted inclusive of EI related nursing abilities and traits such as leadership, health, reflection, ethical behavior, nursing student performance, and job retention/satisfaction. Studies of EI constructs, test instruments, and contrary viewpoints were also examined. The analysis included 395 EI studies of approximately 65,300 participants. All the studies reported a positive correlation with EI ranging from weak to strong with a moderate cumulative effect size of r = 0.3022 across all studies. This study may contribute to positive social change by reducing employers time and cost for training newly licensed nurses, thereby decreasing the overall cost of health care to the public.

Promoting critical perspectives in mental health nursing education

This paper explores themes relevant to mental health nursing using the example of one educational module of a nursing degree. The authors argue that the educational preparation of mental health nursing students in higher education must address certain contested philosophical, conceptual, social and ethical dimensions of contemporary mental health care practice. These themes are discussed within the context of a third-year mental health nursing module within a Scottish nursing degree programme. By interlinking epistemology and ontology, the notion of student as 'critical practitioner', involving the encouragement of 'critical thinking', is developed. This is shown via engagement with parallel perspectives of the sciences and the humanities in mental health. Narratives of student nurse engagement with selected literary texts demonstrate the extent to which issues of knowledge, self-awareness and personal development are central to a student's professional journey as they progress through an academic course. The paper concludes by suggesting that these 'critical perspectives' have important wider implications for curriculum design in nursing education. Insights from critical theory can equip nurse educators to challenge consumerist tendencies within contemporary higher education by encouraging them to remain knowledgeable, critical and ethically sensitive towards the needs of their students.

Perceptual shifts of priority: a qualitative study bringing emotional intelligence to the foreground for nurses in talk-based therapy roles

This paper presents the findings of a qualitative study conceptually framed by social constructionism that explored the experiences of mental health nurses engaging in talk-based therapy roles. Constructions from the participants' narratives are shown to have a powerful resonance with the construct of emotional intelligence, a resonance also echoed from the literature, and policies from the UK identified within the paper. Forwarded is that rather than prioritizing the development of technical approaches of specific therapies, nurses should equally be prepared for talk-based therapy roles through developing their emotionally intelligence capabilities.

Emotional intelligence of mental health nurses

AIMS

The aim of this study is to gain insight into the level of emotional intelligence of mental health nurses in the Netherlands.

BACKGROUND

The focus in research on emotional intelligence to date has been on a variety of professionals. However, little is known about emotional intelligence in mental health nurses.

METHOD

The emotional intelligence of 98 Dutch nurses caring for psychiatric patients is reported. Data were collected with the Bar-On Emotional Quotient Inventory within a cross-sectional research design.

RESULTS

The mean level of emotional intelligence of this sample of professionals is statistically significant higher than the emotional intelligence of the general population. Female nurses score significantly higher than men on the subscales Empathy, Social Responsibility, Interpersonal Relationship, Emotional Self-awareness, Self-Actualisation and Assertiveness. No correlations are found between years of experience and age on the one hand and emotional intelligence on the other hand.

CONCLUSIONS

The results of this study show that nurses in psychiatric care indeed score above average in the emotional intelligence required to cope with the amount of emotional labour involved in daily mental health practice.

RELEVANCE TO CLINICAL PRACTICE

The ascertained large range in emotional intelligence scores among the mental health nurses challenges us to investigate possible implications which higher or lower emotional intelligence levels may have on the quality of care. For instance, a possible relation between the level of emotional intelligence and the quality of the therapeutic nurse-patient relationship or the relation between the level of emotional intelligence and the manner of coping with situations characterised by a great amount of emotional labour (such as caring for patients who self-harm or are suicidal).

Teaching undergraduate students community nursing: using action research to increase engagement and learning

Nurses play a pivotal role in responding to the changing needs of community health care. Therefore, nursing education must be relevant, responsive, and evidence based. We report a case study of curriculum development in a community nursing unit embedded within an undergraduate nursing degree. We used action research to develop, deliver, evaluate, and redesign the curriculum. Feedback was obtained through self-reflection, expert opinion from community stakeholders, formal student evaluation, and critical review. Changes made, especially in curriculum delivery, led to improved learner focus and more clearly linked theory and practice. The redesigned unit improved performance, measured with the university's student evaluation of feedback instrument (increased from 0.3 to 0.5 points below to 0.1 to 0.5 points above faculty mean in all domains), and was well received by teaching staff. The process confirmed that improved pedagogy can increase student engagement with content and perception of a unit as relevant to future practice.