MEN IN NURSING: THE DEVELOPMENT OF A THEORETICAL CONSTRUCT FOR DELAYED OCCUPATIONAL CHOICE (VOCATIONAL, CAREER).
Contributors: North Carolina State University.
Published: 1984
Number of pages: 134
Subjects: Health Sciences, Nursing.
Description: The problem was defined as a lack of information on why men do not enter nursing, since practically all (97.29 percent in 1981) nurses are women. Reviews of the literature on occupational choice theory, sex equity, and men in nursing revealed few consistencies about men who enter nursing. From the literature and pilot study conducted in eastern North Carolina of male nurses, a list of 31 factors believed to be related to men choosing nursing as a career was identified.

Data were collected via a mail-out questionnaire from a study population of 85 male nurses who had graduated from North Carolina schools of nursing from 1978 to 1981. The men in the study population had delayed their entrance into a school of nursing 0 to 30 years after completing high school, with an average delay of 7.5 years. Of 15 work values studied, men in nursing were scored higher than a population norm on 9 of 15 work values on Super's Work Values Inventory (1970), and lower on six values. There was no difference between the population norm and the men in the study population on nine of the work values. Most of the men in the study population had a health related experience in the military service, and/or had been employed in another health related job, and were encouraged by close friends and relatives in health occupations to enter nursing.

In addition to the Work Values Inventory (Super, 1970), three other dependent variables were studied: Delayed Choice, that is the number of years between high school graduation and entrance into nursing, Satisfaction With Nursing, and Beliefs About Society's Image of Nursing as a Career Option for Men. Three regression models were designed, and the dependent variables were regressed on selected independent variables. A large proportion of the variability in the dependent variable was accounted for by the regression model in each instance. Also in each instance, three partial regression coefficients were found to be significantly greater than zero.

Implications and recommendations were made and a theoretical construct for delayed occupational choice was presented.
Notes: Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 46-02, Section: B, page: 0473.

Thesis (ED.D.)--NORTH CAROLINA STATE UNIVERSITY, 1984.

School code: 0155.