Personality Traits and the Clinical Environment`s Stress Resources in Nursing Students

The clinical environment always has been the most stressful course of nursing education. Personality traits can be influential factors in stress resources and responding to stress. The present study investigates the correlation between personality traits and nursing students’ stress resources in the clinical environment.

This descriptive correlational study was planned and performed on Zanjan University of Medical Sciences nursing students. The research population was 215 students selected by stratified random sampling method from all nursing students in the third to eighth semesters. We used an electronic questionnaire for data gathering, including three sections: demographic characteristics, NEO personality traits, and stress resources in the clinical environment. The data were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics.

The most and least stressful resources were related to the score of unpleasant emotions and interpersonal relationships. We found a significant positive correlation between neuroticism personality traits and all four stress resources (p < 0.05). The results also showed a significant correlation between all scores of personality traits and perceived stress from unpleasant emotions except the openness to experience trait (p < 0.05). Furthermore, the relationship between age, gender, semester, interest, and stress resources in the clinical environment was statistically significant (p < 0.05).

Paying attention to the nursing student’s clinical performance to maintain the patient’s health is vital and unavoidable. Therefore, more than ever in the preclinical course of nursing education, improving the psychological readiness and simulation training method can reduce the harmful effects of the clinical environment’s stress resources on their clinical performance.