Personal values of baccalaureate nursing students in Turkey

Abstract

Value education is aimed at helping students develop a mode of reasoning, enabling them to make decisions and deal with conflicts on a daily basis. For this, it should firstly be assessment personal values of nursing students. The purpose of the study was to determine the personal values of nursing students with respect to certain variables. The population of the study, which had a cross-sectional design, included all undergraduate students (n?=?525) attending the nursing school. The sample group comprised 397 nursing students selected from among the nursing students attending a baccalaureate programme in Turkey using the disproportional cluster sampling method. Data were collected utilizing the Personal Information Form and Value Preferences Scale. The personal values of the students were found to be moral, social, financial/economic, aesthetic, political, religious and scientific/theoretical values. The study suggested that the age, year at school and economic level of the family affected the students' values. Values influence behaviours that are an essential component of humanistic nursing care. They are integral to professional socialization, evident in nursing care and fundamental decisions that affect practice.