La prossima generazione di infermieri: panoramica di un’Università italiana

Introduction The career of nurse is one of the most chosen, thanks to its good social reputation and career perspectives. The study aims to examine the motivations that lead the students to take up the nursing career, to explore their previous knowledge and self-efficacy perception about nursing activities and to investigate the association between these variables. Methods An observational descriptive study has been conducted. A motivational orientation scale and a prior knowledge and perceived self-efficacy evaluation scale have been administered to 874 nursing students of Tor Vergata University of Rome. Results and conclusions The results show that the main reasons that lead to the choice of the nursing career are 1) to help the people and to be socially useful, considered a genuine ideal, and 2) a previous experience (personal or not) in the nursing context. These findings are in line with the literature. Besides, the more the students are motivated by genuine ideals, the more they are aware about nursing activities and feel themselves self-efficacy.