Staff nurses’ perceptions of the profession of nursing

In its struggle to be recognized as a legitimate profession, nursing has proceeded in several directions, promoting diversity of professional views among its practitioners. The many changes taking place in nursing supported the need for a study determining exactly how staff nurses view the profession of nursing. The criteria of a profession as defined by Valiga (1982): the boundaries, goals, and scholarly component of the discipline, the recipient of the discipline's service, the relationship of the discipline to others, and the independence, responsibility, autonomy, commitment, and activities of the discipline's practitioners (pp. 126-127), were the basis of the study. The views of the profession as held by the staff nurses were related to the variables of age, preparatory and/or additional nursing education, number of years worked since graduation, length of time in present employment, and the agency of employment. The 600 subjects were randomly selected by computer at the Registered Nurses' Association of British Columbia (R.N.A.B.C.). The Views About Nursing Questionnaire, developed by Valiga (1982), along with a background information questionnaire were sent to the subjects by the R.N.A.B.C. A total of 262 usable questionnaires were the basis of data analysis. Pearson product-moment correlations and analysis of variance were performed as appropriate. These analyses revealed that there was an inverse, but not statistically significant, relationship between age and number of years worked and scores on the Views About Nursing Questionnaire. There was no relationship between the scores and education and the scores and length of time in present employment. Because a large majority of respondents were employed in acute care hospitals, no analysis of the relationship of agency of employment and the scores was undertaken. Conclusions and implications of this study are addressed and suggestions for further study are presented.Applied Science, Faculty ofNursing, School ofGraduat