For a long time, nursing students have been reported to avoid mental health nursing as a career. The primary issue that has led to the situation stemming from the negative perceptions and attitudes that society has had against the mentally ill individuals (Creamer & Austin, 2017). The other factor originates from the poor impressions of the clinical medical experiences that are experienced by the nursing students from the various medical schools and institutions regarding nursing education. The stigma surrounding the mentally ill members of the community does not only influence the mental health clinical experiences in the healthcare institutions but also the feeling that the nurses and the other healthcare providers have for the mentally ill individuals (Creamer & Austin, 2017). The perceptions about the work have thus led many medical and nursing students to stay away from mental health nursing as a career. The students have been missing the opportunities in the field as they tend to crowd in the other areas of nursing.
Previous studies performed in different countries indicate that the nursing students have negative attitudes towards the members of the community with mental illnesses and many tend to keep away from the mental health facilities after graduation from the nursing schools (Campbell, Yonge, & Austin, 2016). The few nursing students who end up in the mental healthcare facilities may have issues related to job dissatisfaction, owing to the negative perceptions that they have been exposed to in their earlier lives. The dissatisfaction leads to a decrease in the quality of care for the patients suffering from mental illnesses (Campbell, Yonge, & Austin, 2016). Previous studies have also indicated that the negative perceptions that the nursing students harbor against mental health facilities may originate from the averted interest from the field and the lack of understanding of the expectations and challenges that there may be in the mental health docket (Campbell, Yonge, & Austin, 2016). The knowledge of the students' perceptions may help in the development of educational strategies that focus on the improvement of the attitudes that the nursing students have regarding the mental health sector.
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Methods
The researches performed quantitative research to examine the attitudes that the nursing students have towards the people suffering from mental illnesses in society. A quasi-experimental research design was used to collect and analyze the data in the research. The participants of the study were made up of a sample of 310 nursing students from eight professional nursing programs (Hastings, Kroposki, & Williams, 2017). Among the participants, 87.1% were female. Among the participants, 51.6% of them were enrolled in a mental health course during their junior year while the rest were enrolled in their courses during their senior year (Hastings, Kroposki, & Williams, 2017). Additionally, 77.7% of the participants attended the traditional nursing programs while the rest attended the non-traditional nursing programs. The sample of participants allowed them to be from different professional programs in the field of nursing (Hastings, Kroposki, & Williams, 2017). The data collection sites were the eight accredited baccalaureate-nursing programs in the states of Minnesota and Pennsylvania in the United States of America. The students were instructed to complete surveys based on the Likert-type response for each question ranging from 1-strongly disagree to 7-strongly agree. In the end, the students completed two surveys; the Psychiatric Mental Health Clinical Placement Survey for First Day of Placement and the Psychiatric Mental Health Clinical Placement Survey for the Last Day of Placement (Hastings, Kroposki, & Williams, 2017). During the data analysis, the collected data were fed into the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) software for analysis. The means and standard deviations were computed from the two surveys. The method of collecting the data was appropriate in the research due to a large number of participants and their expansiveness in the eight institutions. The analysis of the data using the SPSS software package was also appropriate for the data collected using the survey method of data collection.
Findings
After the analysis of the collected data, the results indicated that the subscales for the negative attitudes and the knowledge that the participants have about mental illness indicated the modest reported reliability. The preparedness and the future career subscales demonstrated stronger reliability than those of the negative attitudes and the knowledge that the participants have regarding mental illnesses (Hastings, Kroposki, & Williams, 2017). The average distinction for the subscale of the negative attitudes displayed a response magnitude in better the pre- and post-test findings as expected after the clinical and content exposure. The evaluation for the second subscale highlighted a higher post-test mean according to the increase in the perceived knowledge concerning individuals with mental illnesses. The findings support the hypotheses in the research, which covers the nursing course that was meant to improve the students' attitudes towards the students with mental illnesses and how the society views them (Hastings, Kroposki, & Williams, 2017). Hypothetically, the research was meant to improve the students' attitudes towards mental illnesses in society and the people suffering from the maladies. The nursing course that the students were exposed to improved their perceptions about such people. The course also targeted the other hypothesis regarding the equipment of nursing students with adequate knowledge about mental illnesses and their treatment. The learning will be an essential part of the preparation of the students in the nursing sector to work in the mental illnesses category. That links with the other hypothesis in the research stating that the students will feel better about working with the mentally ill patients after being part of the study. At the end of the mental health nursing course for the students surveyed in the research, the subscale for the future career interest did not display a huge improvement. Therefore, it was found out that the last hypothesis concerning the increase in the students' interest in choosing mental health, as a career was not supported.
Discussion
The perceptions regarding the field of mental health in the nursing industry have been negative among the students that have made many of them stay away from it, while those who are in it have faced low motivation at work and dissatisfaction (Wing, Regan, & Spence Laschinger, 2015). The findings from the performed research support the idea that the completion of a mental health nursing course is the most fundamental step that can be taken to change the attitude and the perceptions that the nursing students have had against mental health nursing as a career (Wing, Regan, & Spence Laschinger, 2015). In addition to transforming the perceptions that the nursing students have for the mental health nursing as a career, the course will also help in the increase of the morale that the nurses have in their work to boost their satisfaction and enable the nursing institutions to handle the negative stereotypes that the students have regarding mental health nursing. The students will be better equipped to deal with the negative beliefs about mental illnesses in society and people who suffer from them.
From the research, it is evident that some of the students stay away from mental health nursing as a career due to the lack of knowledge regarding how to handle the patients and how to be motivated at work. Most of the times, such students will have a deficit in the knowledge regarding their preparedness to work in a facility that caters for the mentally ill in the society in terms of handling them and giving them the right medication to facilitate their recovery and control (Wing, Regan, & Spence Laschinger, 2015). From the findings and discussions of the researchers in the nursing sector, it is clear that the administration of the nursing course and the classroom lectures is an essential tool towards the betterment of the feelings that the students harbor for mental illnesses and how to handle them and the individuals who have them in the society. Therefore, the course plays a vital role in making the students develop better perceptions about mental health in the community.
The major limitation in the study was that extra emphasis was laid on the educational factors affecting the career choice attitudes among the nursing students. The narrow focal point of the research was oblivious of the fact that other factors in the students' lives may lead to their development of a negative attitude towards education. Some of such factors are the emotional and social aspects of the students that have a role to play in how they view particular fields in the professional nursing industry at large. Future studies could approach an exploration of the other factors that play a role in the development of a negative attitude towards mental health not only in the nursing field but also in society.
Conclusion
The development of negative perception towards the mental health career in the field of nursing has led to many students in the field to avoid the profession and those already in it developing a negative attitude towards it. The research was performed to probe into the reasons why the students harbored a poor image regarding mental health and what can be done to revert the situation. The findings of the study indicate that the negative perceptions that the students have for mental health in the community originate from their lack of extensive knowledge on the field and their negative attitude towards mental illness. The administration of the nursing course is the best way to change the perceptions of the students towards mental health.
References
Campbell, R. J., Yonge, O., & Austin, W. (2016). Intimacy Boundaries: Between Mental Health
Nurses & Psychiatric Patients. Journal of Psychosocial Nursing and Mental Health Services , 43 (5), 32-39.
Creamer, A. M., & Austin, W. (2017). Canadian Nurse Practitioner Core Competencies
Identified: An Opportunity to Build Mental Health and Illness Skills and Knowledge. The Journal for Nurse Practitioners , 13 (5), e231-e236.
Hastings, T., Kroposki, M., & Williams, G. (2017). Can Completing a Mental Health Nursing
Course Change Students' Attitudes? Issues in mental health nursing , 38 (5), 449-454.
Wing, T., Regan, S., & Spence Laschinger, H. K. (2015). The Influence of Empowerment and
Incivility on the Mental Health of New Graduate Nurses. Journal of Nursing Management , 23 (5), 632-643.
