ATTRIBUTION OF PAIN RESPONSE TO ETHNIC GROUPS: A STUDY OF REGISTERED NURSES.
Contributors: State University of New York at Buffalo.
Published: 1986
Number of pages: 175
Subjects: Health Sciences, Nursing.; Sociology, Ethnic and Racial Studies.
Description: Individuals are subjected to a constant bombardment of social stimuli; in order to "make sense" of all these stimuli, and to help predict likely outcomes of social interaction, the individual develops certain attitudes about objects, persons, and situations in his environment. Along with these attitudes, the individual attributes certain characteristics or behaviors to those with whom he comes in contact. The main function of this attribution process is to provide the individual a better understanding and greater control over his environment by giving probabilities for other's behaviors and corresponding guidelines for his own.

A registered nurse goes through such a process with patients. Her classification of patients may be based upon a diagnosis, a physical characteristic, or a particular behavior--such as response to pain.

An individual's response to pain is a highly subjective behavior which may be influenced by a number of factors, among which is the patient's ethnicity. In particular, an individual's beliefs and attitudes regarding his own health, illness, and response to pain are likely to be embedded within the ethnic-social-cultural structure.

This study sought to determine whether: nurse attribute particular responses to pain to specific ethnic groups and are these responses similar to those reported in the literature. And which background factors of the nurse have the greatest impact in producing these attributions.

In Phase I, 22 open-ended interviews with registered nurses were conducted to explore whether and how they displayed this particular attribution behavior.

Phase II used this interview information to design a questionnaire which focused nurse attribution behavior towards five ethnic groups. Two hundred sixty-nine registered nurses employed in selected units of five hospitals participated in the study.

Scales were developed which identified the attribution of stoic and expressive behaviors. The study found that registered nurses do attribute to Irish-American and the Polish-American patients stoic behavior, and to Italian-American, the Jewish-American and the Black-American patients expressive behavior in response to pain. These results are similar to those reported in the literature. The study could not determine which demographic or attitudinal features of the nurse contributed to this behavior. Possible reasons for and implications of these findings were discussed.
Notes: Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 47-02, Section: B, page: 0570.

Thesis (PH.D.)--STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK AT BUFFALO, 1986.

School code: 0656.