Registered Nurses Perceptions of TheirUse of Critical Thinkng Skills in the Clinical Setting
Graduation Date
1-2008
Document Type
Master's Thesis
Document Form
Degree Name
Master of Science
Department
Nursing
Department or Program Chair
Barbara Ganley, PhD
Thesis Advisor
Barbara Ganley, PhD, RN, HNC
Abstract
In the hospital setting Registered Nurses are called upon to pull from a variety of sources as they deliver safe and effective care to their patients. They must have the physical skills and technical knowledge to identify what is occurring with their patient at any given time (Kuiper, 2004). The registered nurse must also be able to synthesize information, apply concepts and develop a plan of care; the registered nurse must have the ability to think critically. Registered nurses are critically thinking when they evoke i effective, reasonable thinking about nursing problems without a single solution, and when making clinical decisions, diagnostic reasoning or professional judgments. Critical thinking is a creative process as nurses identify areas within their clinical practice where new theories need to be developed.
This study investigates how registered nurses practicing in clinical settings define critical thinking and how they perceive their use of it in their delivery of patient care. Additionally, this research also examines the interaction between the nurse s tendencies toward the use of critical thinking (habits of the mind) and how they perceive their use of
critical thinking in practice.
The themes that emerged were consistent within the five Modes of Thinking Proposed by Rubenfeld and Scheffer in their T.H.I.N.K. model of critical thinking in nursing (Rubenfeld and Scheffer, 1999). The responses are organized into categories that are consistent with this structure. The themes are Total Recall, Habits, Inquiry, New Ideas and Creativity, and Knowing How You Think.
Based on the tool designed to assess how the nurses perceived their ability and habits of the mind to critically think they demonstrated a consistent internal motivation and mental ability to make professional judgments in the workplace. In addition to identifying their disposition towards critical thinking and its applications, the professional nurses were able to provide exemplars that reflected the ability of the professional to interpret a situation, analyze the relationships within that situation, infer action and interventions, and evaluate outcomes.