title: Professional identity in nursing: UK students' explanations for poor standards of care.
abstract: Research concludes that professional socialisation in nursing is deeply problematic because new recruits start out identifying with the profession's ideals but lose this idealism as they enter and continue to work in the profession. This study set out to examine the topic focussing on the development of professional identity. Six focus groups were held with a total of 49 2nd and 3rd year BSc nursing students studying at a university in London, UK and their transcripts were subject to discourse analysis. Participants' talk was strongly dualistic and inflected with anxiety. Participants identified with caring as an innate characteristic. They described some qualified nurses as either not possessing this characteristic or as having lost it. They explained strategies for not becoming corrupted in professional practice. Their talk enacted distancing from 'bad' qualified nurses and solidarity with other students. Their talk also featured cynicism. Neophyte nurses' talk of idealism and cynicism can be understood as identity work in the context of anxiety inherent in the work of nurses and in a relatively powerless position in the professional healthcare hierarchy.
authors: Centre for Critical Research in Nursing & Midwifery, Middlesex University, The Burroughs, London, NW4 4BT, UK. Electronic address: m.traynor@mdx.ac.uk.
authors: Michael
authors: M
authors: Traynor
authors: Faculty of Nursing and Midwifery, Sydney University, St. Vincent's Hospital Sydney, Australia.
authors: Niels
authors: N
authors: Buus
mesh_terms: D001291:Attitude of Health Personnel; D002055:Burnout, Professional / Q000209:etiology / Q000523:psychology; D004645:Empathy; D017144:Focus Groups; D006801:Humans; D008131:London; D024382:Professional Role / Q000523:psychology*; D036301:Qualitative Research; D059039:Standard of Care / Q000592:standards*; D013338:Students, Nursing / Q000523:psychology*
keywords: Anxiety; Care and compassion; Discourse analysis; Focus groups; Nurses; Professional identity; United Kingdom