Incivility Experienced By Nursing Students in Clinical Settings

Background: Clinical experience is the crux on which nursing education begins to evolve into patient-care ability. Professional social expectations are encountered during the clinical practicum and students develop behaviors based on these interactions. However, nursing students often experienced incivility in clinical settings, and these occurrences significantly influence their outcomes in clinical practicums. Therefore, our study explored the existing knowledge about incivility toward nursing students through literature review. Methods: Data was collected from February 28, 2018 through March 21, 2018. A search for articles published in English from 2007- 2017. Databases (EBSCOhost Academic Search Premier, and PubMed) were used for the search, using the keywords “nursing student,” “incivility,” “rudeness,” and “clinical practice.” The search resulted in a total of 2,000 articles. A screening process was conducted and resulted in 7 articles for the literature review. The search was documented using a table. Review results: The literature review revealed nursing students encountered incivility during clinical rotations predominantly from nursing personnel. Anthony and Yastik (2011) demonstrated that incivility experience affected students’ self-confidence and attitude toward nursing in the qualitative study with a sample of 21 nursing students. Through the focus group study of 24 nursing students, Altmiller (2012) found that incivility was related to unprofessional behavior, poor communication technique, power gradient targeting, inequality, loss of control over one’s world, stressful clinical environment authority failure, and difficult peer behaviors. Anthony et al. (2014) confirmed that higher stress levels were significantly correlated to more incivility experiences in the cross-sectional study of 106 nursing students. Babenko-Mould and Laschinger (2014) discovered the significant association between incivility from staff nurses and students’ cynicism. Meanwhile, Thomas et al. (2015) concluded that incivility led to student disillusionment with the reality of nursing practice and their role as a student nurse. Wallace et al. (2015) reported discourteous behaviors exacerbated students’ fear of failure during the clinical practice. Furthermore, Birks et al. (2017) stated that incivility stemmed from RNs, hospital staff, and patients. Conclusions: After researching the material, limitations were demonstrated by the lack of articles related to the topic, an absence of a universal guideline for what incivility is, small sample sizes, and a focus on BSN programs. As the nursing profession evolves it should prioritize the protection of students from incivility to provide a balanced education for future nurses