Efficacy of an Interactive Session on Nursing Students' Perception of Assertiveness in Clinical Milieu

Assertiveness is an important behaviour for today's professional nurse. As nurses move away from traditional subservient roles and perceived stereotypes it is increasingly being recognized that a nurse needs to behave in an assertive manner. Assertiveness is necessary for effective nurse/patient communication, and it is suggested that its development may also aid the confidence of the profession as it develops. Assertive behaviour may be encouraged through educational methods. It is preferable that nurses receive this educational preparation during undergraduate programmes. Nurse educators have an important role in the development and implementation of assertiveness training/education programmes for undergraduate nursing students. In spite of all the developments, helping nurses develop a correct attitude towards assertiveness is a knotty task. The present study revealed that interactive session on Assertiveness was found to be effective as the mean post-test Assertiveness score (27.64) was higher than mean pre-test Assertiveness scores (19.72). The mean differences between pre-test and post-test were found to be statistically significant at p< 0.01 level of significance. (Mean difference 7.920, standard error of difference 1.25, 95% confidence interval 6.95 to 8.88, t = 16.31, p< 0.01). Significant association was found only in the areas of self perception of one's participation in extracurricular activities and marks obtained in second year. Majority, 81.33% of the students strongly agreed that the session had a good mix of activities and strongly agreed that the role plays done provided a useful experience and 41.33% stated they had passive- aggressive type of response pattern and session was found to be positively sensitizing the students towards Assertiveness in clinical milieu.