Investigation of the impact of cognitive behavioral oriented preclinical simulation on the nursing students with high level of professional performance anxiety

This study was planned to examine the impact of cognitive behavioral oriented preclinical simulation on the nursing students with high level of professional performance anxiety, and was conducted in an action research pattern in which quantitative and qualitative methods were used together. At the various stages of the research, the study groups were the fourth grade nursing students (n = 121) who registered in the spring term of 2018-2019 academic year, the first grade nursing students (n= 140) and intervention group (n = 9) registered in the fall semester of 2019-2020 academic year in Ankara Yıldırım Beyazıt University Faculty of Health Sciences Nursing Department. Individual observation, interview and document / text content analysis were used as the qualitative data collection method; and Liebowitz Social Anxiety Scale (LSAS) and Anxiety Symptoms Checklist were used as quantitative data collection tools. The implementation of the study consisted of the preparation phase and the action research process. The preparation phase included creating a simulation scenario, preparing data collection forms, evaluating the training environment and technical equipment. The action research process consisted of revealing the problem, implementation of the action plan and monitoring. The average age of first and fourth grade nursing students participating in the research was 18.58±1.02 and 22.24±1.03 respectively. Nine students participated in the intervention group; 7 female (77.8%) and 2 (22.2%) male, with an average age of 18.78 ± 0.83.The mean total score of the LSAS of the first and fourth grade nursing students was 86.75±19.90 and 83.34±17.34. It was revealed that students' levels of professional performance anxiety did not depend on the grade level (p=0.292). Cognitive behavioral oriented simulation was used as the intervention to the students (n=9) whose professional performance anxiety levels were high. Individual interviews were conducted, each 40-45 minutes long once a week, for a total of 12 sessions. In the process of cognitive behavioral oriented simulation, there was a statistically significant difference between the scores of the intervention group obtained from LSAS at three consequent measurements: pretest, posttest and follow-up test (2 =16.22, p<0.05). According to these results, it can be concluded that the very first intervention of cognitive behavioraloriented simulationis an effective and long lasting method in reducing the level of professional performance anxiety.