Explaining the Relationship between Moral Intelligence and Professional Self-Concept with the Competency of Nursing students in Providing Spiritual Care to Promote Nursing Education

Literature review of the research on nursing students' professional self-concept

OBJECTIVE

To understand the current situation and progress of nursing students' professional self-concept, this review aimed to perform a general analysis of research related to the connotation of professional self-concept, measurement tools, influencing factors, effects, and intervention experiments.

METHODS

Three databases (Web of Science, PubMed, and CNKI) were searched for relevant articles. Research articles that met specific criteria were included, with identified articles initially screened by title and keyword. Then the abstracts were screened for relevance, and the full text was read for validation before inclusion. Descriptive analysis was performed with relevant findings from data retrieved from various sources.

RESULTS

Finally, 54 articles that met the criteria were included, which organised the connotation of self-concept of nursing speciality, and introduced six measurement scales, such as Professional Self-Concept of Nurses Instrument and Nurse's Self-Concept Questionnaire. A total of 16 investigations on influencing factors were described, and the results showed that there were internal individual and external environmental factors. The professional self-concept was formed by analysing both factors. This paper described 17 effect surveys and found that professional self-concept had an important impact on students' mental health, academic performance, and professional values, and so on. Eight intervention experiments including attribution training and hierarchical teaching were evaluated.

CONCLUSIONS

Research articles on the professional self-concept included in this review were rich. These articles clarified the basic connotation of the concept, developed relatively mature measurement tools, found many influencing factors and effects, and proposed effective intervention strategies. They were of great value for understanding the professional self-concept and could provide a reference for scholars to conduct relevant research and practice. It also presents research prospects in this field, aiming to inspire future research.

Predicting moral intelligence in nursing students and its relationships with self-compassion, and cultural competence: a cross-sectional study

Background

In the recent era, nursing needs employees with moral intelligence, cultural competence, and self-compassion skills more than ever. This study aimed to determine the predictors of moral intelligence and its relationship with self-compassion and cultural competence in nursing students.

Methods

This cross-sectional and multi-center descriptive study was conducted in 2022. With convenience sampling, 250 nursing students from three Iranian universities participated in this study. Data gathering included the Moral Intelligence Questionnaire, Self-Compassion Scale (short form), and Cultural Competency Questionnaire. The data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, the correlation between variables, and hierarchical regression.

Results

The results showed that nursing students had good moral intelligence (72.63 ± 11.38), moderate self-compassion (37.19 ± 5.02), and poor cultural competence (50.06 ± 13.15). No statistically significant relationship was observed between self-compassion and cultural competence (r = 0.11, p = 0.07). Moral intelligence with marital status (r = 0.16, p = 0.01), academic year (r = 0.14, p = 0.03) and self-compassion (r = 0.33, p < 0.001) had a significant relationship in such a way that these variables explained 15% of moral intelligence and self-compassion had the highest impact (p < 0.001).

Conclusion

Considering the moderate level of self-compassion and the poor level of cultural competence reported in the undergraduate nursing students, and also that self-compassion was known to be a predictive factor for moral intelligence, planners and educators must pay more attention to promoting self-compassion and cultural competency in the curriculum and conduct studies to find ways to improve them.

Role of judgment in promoting nurses' decisions and ethical behavior

BACKGROUND

Ethical decision-making and behavior of nurses are major factors, which can effect on the quality of nursing care. It seems that there is a correlation between demographic variables and ethical decision-making and moral behaviors of nurses. Promoting patients' health is one of the issues related to nurses' ethical behaviors. The aim of this study was to determine the role of judgment in promoting nurses' decisions and ethical behavior.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

This was a descriptive, cross-sectional study in which 260 nurses were selected based on the inclusion criteria. Sampling method was available. The data collection tool was the Hospital Ethics Committee Survey Questionnaire. Data were analyzed by SPSS software version 20.

RESULTS

In this study, judgments and ethical behaviors of nurses were evaluated at the moderate and good level. Gender, marriage status, education level, and nursing position were effective in judgments and ethical behavior of nurses. Age, job experience, and participation in the ethics workshop had no significant effect on ethical behavior and moral judgment. The mean score of moral belief of nurses participating in this study was 181.56 ± 17.60, and their mean moral practice in the real environment was 168.5 ± 17.77.

CONCLUSION

The judgment competencies in ethical situation of nurses should be promoted to a higher level. It seems that more advanced educational methods are needed to achieve this goal. The findings from this study show the necessity of nurses' ability to improve their behavior and moral judgment. It also shows that nurses need more reinforcement based on the demographic variables.

Investigation of moral intelligence's predictive components in students of Shahid Beheshti university of medical sciences (SBMU)

This study aimed to investigate dominant predictor components of moral intelligence (MI) based on the Lennick and Kiel's model in students of Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences (SBMU).

In this descriptive-analytical study, 322 students of SBMU were chosen through cluster sampling. To collect data, a 40-item questionnaire, whose validity and reliability was confirmed in previous studies, based on the Lennick and Kiel's model was used. The collected data were analyzed by SPSS 21 software using appropriate descriptive and analytical statistics. Of 322 participants, 180 and 142 were female and male, respectively. The mean age of the participants was 22.30±2.69 years. The study’s regression analysis revealed that the most and the least direct effects were related to the forgiveness (R2=0.320) and compassion (R2=0.284) components, respectively. Among the inspected components, the responsibility component with an overall effect of R2=0.655 was shown to be the strongest predictor component of MI. Universities play a significant role in students’ moral development and enhancement. The present study’s findings suggest that developing strategic plans and interventions can enhance MI level (e.g., incentive systems for individuals maintaining high moral responsibility). Since today’s students will be tomorrow’s medical and healthcare professionals, upgrading of MI level in students studying in various divisions of medical sciences enhances their moral responsibility through setting out strong ethics principles to follow and the quality of care that they will provide to patients, thereby improving health.