THE RELATIONSHIPS OF RESILIENCE, PRACTICAL PROBLEMS ON THE WARD AND SOCIAL SUPPORT TO STRESS AMONG NURSING STUDENTS

Abstract

                Objective: This descriptive correlational study aimed at investigating the relationships of resilience, practical problems on the ward, and social support to stress among nursing students.

                Methods: The samples were 168 third and fourth-year nursing students studying in the Bachelor of Nursing Science Program of a nursing education institution in the central region of Thailand who have experienced both theory and practicum courses. The purposive sampling was used to select the samples. The instruments for data collection were the Personal Information Questionnaire, Perceived Stress Scale-10 (PSS-10), the Resilience Inventory, Questionnaire on the Opinions of Nursing Students towards Practical Problems on the Ward, and Personal Resource Questionnaire (PRQ Part II).  Descriptive statistics and Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient were used for data analyses.

                Results: The findings revealed that resilience and social support were negatively and statistically significantly associated with stress (r = -.36, p = .000; r = -.42, p = .000) and practical problems on the ward were positively related to stress with statistical significance (r = .28, p = .000).

                Conclusion: The results of this study can be applied to develop a program to enhance resilience, awareness of available social support resources, and effective coping strategies to deal with the practical problems on the ward in order to prevent or reduce stress among nursing students.