A Survey On Nursing Students' Perception Of Actual And Preferred Clinical Learning Environment

Objective: The aim of this study were: To assess nursing students' perceptions of the actual and preferred clinical learning environment; To examine the differences between students' perceptions of the actual clinical learning environment and their preferred clinical learning environment; To investigate associations between students' satisfaction of their clinical placements and their perceptions of the clinical learning environment..Method: A descriptive design and a convenient sampling method were employed in this study. The clinical learning environment inventory(CLEI) was used to collect data. The final sample group consisted of 110 undergraduate nursing students in Qingdao medical college and 60 undergraduate nursing students in Wuhan University who were undertaking clinical placements in hospitals. The inventory was consisted of three parts: The first part was used to collect basic facts of the students; The second part is the inventory established by Chan Dsk in Australia which was used to investigate nursing students'perceptions of the actual and preferred clinical learning environments. The third part is two open- ended questions. Face validity was established. Test-retest reliability was 0.75. The internal consistency was satisfying with Cronbach'a coefficient greater than 0.85 for each dimension. Data was analyzed with SPSS 11.0.Result: The overall mean score for CLES in actual form was 132.62±27.07. The overall mean score for CLES in prefered form is 172.94±15.76. The differences between students' perceptions of actual and preferred clinical learning environment were examined by exploring the differences in each scale between the actual and prefered forms. The Bonferroni t-test was carried out for paired samples. The results indicated significant differences in all scales between the actual and preferred forms. A one-way ANOVA was used to compare the scales of the actual form among the four clinical sites. The results indicated that there were significant differences in the mean scores across the four groups in five scales. To examine the nature of the relationships between the outcome measure (Satisfaction) and each scale of the CLEI (Actual version), simple bivariate correlations (r) were used as a measurement of each linear relationship. The values of the simple correlation coefficients, ranged from 0.80 to 0.65. To predict the relationship between the outcome measure, student satisfaction, and all other scales of the CLEI simultaneously, multiple regression analysis was carried out. The result indicates that personalization, task orientation, student involvement, and innovation reached statistical significance in explaining 78% of the variance in the students'perception of the social climate of their clinical placement.Conclusion: Students perceived personalization as the top priority in the clinical learning environment. Students have been found to prefer a more positive learning environment than they perceive to be present. Students' satisfaction was significantly greater in students who highly valued personalization, task orientation, involvement, and innovation in their clinical placement.