The impact of grit, gratitude disposition and stress on psychological well-being among nursing students during the Covid-19 pandemic: a structural equation modeling

Purpose: The purposes of this study were to develop and test a model for the effects of grit, gratitude disposition, and stress on the psychological well-being of nursing students during the Coronavirus-2019 pandemic.Methods: The data were collected from June 9 to June 27, 2021. A total of 286 nursing students responded to an online questionnaire. In the hypothesis’s model, the exogenous variables were grit and gratitude disposition, and the endogenous variables were nursing students’ stress and psychological well-being. Data were analyzed using the SPSS/WIN and AMOS programs.Results: The final model showed the following indices of goodness of fit: χ2 =78.30, χ2 /df=3.01, GFI=.95, CFI=.96, TLI=.94, SRMR=.05, and RMSEA=.08. Nursing students’ psychological well-being was explained by their grit, gratitude disposition, and stress directly and indirectly, with these three variables explaining 56% of psychological well-being.Conclusion: This study identified factors affecting the psychological well-being of nursing students in a state of increased stress due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The results of this study can be a basis for developing and applying a program to enhance nursing students' psychological well-being.