Nursing student attitudes toward nursing profession and their state anxiety level during COVID-19 outbreak

This study was designed to investigate nursing students’ attitudes toward the nursing profession and ex-amine their state anxiety level during the coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Methods: The population for this descriptive research was Turkish university nursing students. The study sample consisted of 1653 nursing students who participated in the study between April 25 and May 10, 2020. The Attitude Scale for Nursing Profession (ASNP) and the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI) were used to collect the study data. The Mann-Whitney U test, Kruskal-Wallis test, and the Spearman correlation test were used to evaluate the findings. Results: The mean score of the preference for the nursing profession (PNP) subscale of the ASNP was 51.13±8.61 and the mean score of the general attitude toward the nursing profession (GATNP) subscale score was 34.82±2.80. The mean STAI mean score was 43.95±11.17. There was a weak, negative relationship between the STAI and the PNP (r=-0.279) and the GATNP (r=-0.140) (p<0.05). The 2 most important predictors of state anxiety level were motivation to join the nursing profession and being a female (p