Nursing Students Inclination towards Research: Mixed Method Study to Assess the Attitude and Perceived Challenges

Research has become an intellectual equipment for the human beings to change their lifestyles according to needs and necessities of the society. Nursing education and practice places emphasis upon the use of evidence from research in order to rationalize nursing intervention⁽¹⁾. So the aims of the study were 1. To assess the attitude of undergraduate nursing students towards research. 2. To assess the perceived challenges of undergraduate nursing students towards research. A mixed method (qualitative and quantitative) approach was adopted for the present study, to assess the attitude and perceived challenges of undergraduate nursing students. Attitude was assessed by using Papanastasiou R-ATR scale that consists of 13 different items towards research (quantitative arm) and focus group discussions were conducted for assessing the perceived challenges of nursing students towards research (qualitative arm). The study was conducted on 122 undergraduate nursing students of two different nursing colleges in Bangalore. Samples were recruited using a convenience sampling technique. The Focus group discussion was conducted in 2 sessions, in each session 12 subjects were included, the discussion lasted for 45 to 60 minutes. The data was collected until data saturation was attained. The verbatim were audio recorded and data was then transcribed into themes and subthemes. Descriptive and inferential statistics were used for data analysis of the quantitative arm. The verbatims were transcribed into themes and subthemes.