The Relationship Between Awareness and Attitudes Towards Research and Developments and Academic Motivation Levels in Nursing Students

Abstract

This study was conducted to determine the relationship between nursing students’ awareness and attitudes towards research and developments and their academic motivation levels. This descriptive and cross-sectional study was carried out with students from nursing department of faculty of health sciences of a university in Turkey (n=460). Data were collected using the questionnaire form which included the socio-demographic characteristics of those students, “Nursing Students’ Attitudes to and Awareness of Research and Development within Nursing Scale” and “Academic Motivation Scale”. Data were analyzed using percentage, mean, Pearson’s correlation analysis, Student’s t, and One Way Anova tests. The mean age of the students was 20.56±1.52. 81.1% were female and 28.7% were in their first year. The average score of the Nursing Students’ Attitudes to and Awareness of Research and Development within Nursing Scale was 120.54±17.46. The students’ mean score on intrinsic motivation subscale was 57.20±13.45, on extrinsic motivation subscale was 61.96±11.50 and on amotivation subscale was 10.12±5.87 in Academic Motivation Scale. The level of the students’ awareness and attitudes towards research and developments has a positive correlation with the levels of their intrinsic and extrinsic motivation and a negative correlation with the level of their amotivation (p<0.05). The average score of the Nursing Students’ Attitudes to and Awareness of Research and Development within Nursing Scale were statistically significantly different in the gender, the status of their following scientific publications and the positions they wanted to work after graduation (p<0.05). It has been determined that the students have high level of awareness and attitudes towards research and development, and their academic motivation levels affect their awareness and attitudes towards research and development.