2009 Volume 13 Issue 1 Pages 76-83
The purposes of this study were to examine the relationships between self-education ability and nursing practice, and to find essential learning contents that would allow nurses to continue their professional work. I carried out an unsigned self-report inventory survey of 550 nurses with more than 3 years of experience, working at 11hospitals, each with more than 200 beds, in ‘A' prefecture. Selfeducation ability was measured using a 40 item scale by Kajita & Nishimura, and nursing practice was evaluated by 73 items with 6 sub-scales developed by Shibata, et al.
The total score of self-education ability showed a significant positive correlation with the total of nursing practice. Sub-scales of relaxing patients, responding, supporting patients to make use of strength, being aware of purpose, adjusting situations to individual patients were correlated significantly with 8 items of self-education ability. The items of "skills and basis of study", such as discussion with other people to deepen ideas, referring to objectives for evaluation, understandable explanation to others, investigate suitable study methods for each subject, were included.
These findings suggest that an educational support system is necessary to improve self-education ability.
