The Effect of Concept Mapping on Baccalaureate Nursing Students\u27 Knowledge Acquisition

This dissertation is a series of three papers on the effect of concept mapping on baccalaureate nursing students’ knowledge acquisition. The first paper is an integrative review of the literature on the use of concept mapping in nursing education. The review evidences that concept mapping has been effective in nursing education for increasing students’ critical thinking. However, it shows that no studies addressing the level of nursing knowledge gained using concept mapping were identified, indicating a need for research in the area of the use of concept mapping for nursing knowledge acquisition. The second paper is a feasibility study of the methodological approaches proposed for a research study on the effect of concept mapping on nursing knowledge acquisition of nursing students. It affirms that the proposed methods of teaching concept mapping and scoring concept maps using the Concept Map Structural Scoring Method are feasible and appropriate for such a research study. The third paper is a report of the research study undertaken on the effect of concept mapping on baccalaureate nursing students’ knowledge acquisition. This study reveals that utilizing concept mapping along with lecture appears to help improve baccalaureate students ‘nursing knowledge acquisition, although further research is needed