PATH ANALYTIC STUDY OF FEMALE NURSE CAREER WITHDRAWAL.
Contributors: University of Alabama at Birmingham.
Published: 1984
Number of pages: 140
Subjects: Health Sciences, Health Care Management.
Description: Understanding female registered nurse (RN) withdrawal from the nursing profession is important to solving the problem of the nursing shortage. This study combines sociological variables related to female career withdrawal, such as family priority and family income; managerial variables related to organizational determinants of job satisfaction, such as supervision; pay and routinization; and career commitment in a causal model designed to test the following hypotheses regarding the major causes of RN career withdrawal: (1) Commitment to nursing directly influences withdrawal and intervenes between all other variables and withdrawal. (2) Job satisfaction and the antecedents of job satisfaction influence withdrawal indirectly through commitment. The antecedents of job satisfaction tested are pay equity, routinization, communication, participation, supervision, promotional opportunity, physician relations, patient care time, and continuing education. (3) External personal factors such as opportunity for other employment outside nursing, degree of family priority, and other family income influence withdrawal indirectly through commitment.

This research was developed in conjunction with the Alabama Nurse Study, 1983, an attitude survey of 20,723 nurses. The response rate was 26 percent (7,491). To insure generalizability a random sample of 1076 (with a response rate of 67 percent) was tested against the census using Chi-square tests and found to be comparable. Psychometric tests determined the average construct factor loading to be .77 and the average construct Cronbach's Alpha to be .76.

A series of regression equations, zero-order correlations, and path analytic techniques were used. Tests of the statistical assumptions underlying each of these techniques were conducted and found to be within acceptable ranges for research.

The results were as follows: Commitment was an important construct in understanding withdrawal and did intervene between the effects of job satisfaction and withdrawal. The primary effects of the personal external factors were related directly to withdrawal not indirectly through commitment. Personal external factors were the most important determinants of withdrawal. In order of path coefficient contribution, the significant variables contributing to withdrawal of RNs were other family income (.28), participation (.09), pay equity (-.07), commitment (-.06), and promotional opportunity (.06). Recommendations included suggestions for further study and suggestions for improvements in the study.
Notes: Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 45-05, Section: B, page: 1421.

Thesis (PH.D.)--UNIVERSITY OF ALABAMA AT BIRMINGHAM, 1984.

School code: 0005.