Assertiveness in Nursing Students

The problem that this study focused on was that there was minimal evidence on whether or not nursing students become more assertive throughout their academic education. The purpose of this study was to compare the assertiveness scores of sophomore level nursing students and senior level-nursing students. The study was guided by Hildegard Peplau’s theory of interpersonal relations in nursing, which focuses on the therapeutic process between nurses and patients, rather than on internal patient pathology. The descriptive, comparative study used a 15-question survey design and a convenience sample of sophomore and senior level nursing students at a large urban Midwest university. Recruitment, informed consent, and data collection occurred during the sophomore and senior classes. An independent sample T test was used to determine group differences in assertiveness. The results revealed that the sophomore level students were more assertive than the senior level-nursing students