Job Stress, Job Satisfaction and Intention to Leave Among New Nurses

The difficulties new nurses experience when first entering acute care work environments have been recognized since Kramer’s seminal work in the 1970s. Despite the implementation of interventions designed to help ease the transition, the literature continues to report that new graduates undergo stress when beginning their careers as nurses. The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of perceived demands, control, social support and self-efficacy on the job stress, job satisfaction and intention to leave of new nurses. The conceptual framework used in the study was Karasek’s (1979) Job Demands-Control-Support (JDC-S) model. This model posits that job demands increase employee stress, but that increasing control can alleviate the negative effects of high demands. Social support and self-efficacy were included in this study as potential moderators of the relationships between demands and control and the outcome variables. This was an exploratory study that utilized a cross-sectional survey was used to gather data. Surveys were mailed to the homes of new nurses working in acute care hospitals across Ontario, Canada. Data were received from 232 new nurses, a response rate of 23.8%. Nurses in the sample had an average of 18.2 months of experience. Data were analyzed using separate hierarchical regression models for each dependent variable. The results showed that the main effects of job demands, social support and self-efficacy provided partial support for the JDC-S model when examining job stress, job satisfaction and intention to leave the job. Only self-efficacy was significantly related to intention to leave the profession. There was no evidence of moderating effects of social support or self-efficacy. An understanding of factors in the work environment that influence new nurses may assist in supporting them during the transition. By exploring the effects of demands, control, social support and self-efficacy on new graduates’ job stress, job satisfaction and intention to leave, this study may provide direction to nursing leaders who are working new nurses in acute care.Ph