MENDING A TORN FISH NET: PARSE'S THEORY-GUIDED RESEARCH ON THE LIVED EXPERIENCE OF HOPE (HUMAN BECOMING, TAIWAN, QUALITY OF LIFE).
Contributors: Loyola University of Chicago.
Published: 1997
Number of pages: 155
Subjects: Health Sciences, Nursing.
Description: The metaphor, mending a torn fish net, from a classic Taiwanese folk song was the inspiration for conceptualization of hope. To expand nursing's unique knowledge, Parse's theory of human becoming and research method guided this study. The purpose of this research was to uncover the structure of the lived experience of hope and to explore Parse's method in a transcultural and translinguistic setting. Ten Taiwanese-speaking men between the ages of 59 and 80 who lived in a leprosarium in Taiwan participated in the study.

Through dialogical engagement, they described their lived experience of hope. Extraction-synthesis, a rigorous process, uncovered the structure of the lived experience of hope: Hope is anticipating an unburdening serenity amid despair as nurturing engagements emerge in creating anew with cherished priorities. Three core concepts, which are essential ideas expressed by all participants, are anticipating an unburdening serenity amid despair, nurturing engagements, and creating anew with cherished priorities. Through heuristic interpretation including structural integration and conceptual interpretation, the structure was logically moved across levels of abstraction to the language of science. The structural integration is: Hope is envisioning the unencumbered amid desolation as attentive involvements arise with inventing the treasured. The conceptual interpretation is: Hope is imaging the connecting-separating in originating valuing.

This study presents an alternative to the views of hope in the extant literature. Hope from the perspective of the participants in this study is a chosen way of becoming, thus a way of living health and quality of life. Findings from the study further specify hope as a paradox, rather than the opposite of hopelessness or on a continuum, a dialectic, and nurturing engagements as integral to the structure of hope, rather than a source of it or an intervention. Considerations for using Parse's method in transcultural and translinguistic settings were explored. Recommendations for further research and practice using Parse's theory are offered.
Notes: Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 57-12, Section: B, page: 7457.

Thesis (PH.D.)--LOYOLA UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO, 1997.

School code: 0112.