Peace and Power: A Theory of Emancipatory Group Process

Holistic Wellness Support Systems for Nursing Faculty: A Scoping Review of the Literature

AIM

This scoping literature review was conducted to determine what is currently known about holistic wellness support systems (HWSSs) for nursing faculty.

BACKGROUND

The nurse faculty shortage has contributed to the national nursing shortage. Providing nurse faculty an HWSS may help grow the faculty pipeline.

METHOD

Five electronic databases and Google Scholar were searched using key words related to the research question. Literature published from 2003 to 2023 was included. Joanna Briggs Institute methodology and Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses for Scoping Reviews were used to conduct this review.

RESULTS

The search strategy found 1,525 potential publications; five articles were included in the review. The five wellness support systems strived to create a more cohesive, positive, and healthy work environment for nurse faculty.

CONCLUSION

This review provides a solid inventory of nursing faculty wellness support systems and identifies gaps in areas of wellness and research that could be supported.

Past School Discipline Experiences: Perspectives of Disabled Adults

BACKGROUND

School discipline has potential life-long consequences for students. Disabled youth can be misunderstood and experience harsh discipline and are at increased risk for negative outcomes, yet little research includes their voices. The aim of this study was to explore past school discipline experiences among disabled adults.

METHODS

Disabled adult perspectives (N = 9) regarding past school discipline experiences were explored employing qualitative descriptive methodology framed by the Peace and Power Conceptual Model. Peace-Power versus Power-Over-Powers involve actions/behaviors reflecting critical emancipation or oppression of those in power.

RESULTS

Eight peace-power versus power-over themes emerged: "humiliating," "threatening," "escaping," "observing," "avoiding," "diverging," "isolating," and "failing."

IMPLICATIONS FOR SCHOOL HEALTH POLICY, PRACTICE, AND EQUITY

Disabled students can experience oppressive power-over dynamics separating them from others because they are unable to meet rigid classroom expectations. Educators may lack awareness of structural biases shaping reactions warranting need for school policies and practices promoting restorative justice, social-emotional learning, and inclusion.

CONCLUSIONS

Classroom discipline can represent emancipatory peace-power or oppressive power-over powers. Not all teacher interactions represent 1 power or the other. Future research should focus on including disabled student voices informing school discipline practices. Educators' perspectives of their role fostering inclusive classrooms should also be considered.

Theory analysis and evaluation of emancipatory nursing praxis: A theory of social justice in nursing

PURPOSE

The aim of this paper was to analyze and evaluate the middle-range theory, emancipatory nursing praxis (ENP): a theory of social justice in nursing.

METHODS

Peterson and Bredow's method was utilized to complete the theory evaluation. The theory was evaluated systematically to ensure the appropriateness of application for research in nursing education and transforming nursing students into social justice allies.

FINDINGS

The ENP theory has not been widely used since its introduction in 2017, although it is even more relevant today after the revelation of profound societal inequities during the pandemic. The theory lacks testing and empirical indicators for utilization in nursing practice.

CONCLUSION

ENP addresses the mandate from the American Association of Colleges of Nursing for nurse educators to foster the development of students as social justice leaders and competent caregivers across the life span. This theory provides a framework to apply in nursing education to improve the professional competency in social justice and disparities. However, further research is needed to develop tools to measure outcomes and generalizability.

IMPLICATIONS FOR NURSING PRACTICE

ENP middle-range theory could support nursing educators and nursing programs to develop learning strategies and curricula to facilitate nursing students' knowledge and application in social justice advocates, allies, and leaders, thus improving individual, community, and global health outcomes.

The State of the Science of Nurses' Implicit Bias: A Call to Go Beyond the Face of the Other and Revisit the Ethics of Belonging and Power

This article summarizes the current state of nurses' implicit bias and discusses the phenomenon from Levinas' face of the Other and ethics of belonging, Watson's human caring and unitary caring science, and Chinn's peace and power theory. Nurses' implicit bias is a global issue; the primary sources of nurses' implicit bias include race/ethnicity, sexuality, health conditions, age, mental health status, and substance use disorders. The current research stays at the descriptive level and addresses implicit bias at the individual level. This article invites nurses to go beyond "the face of the Other" and revisit the ethics of belonging and power.

The What, Who, and How of Power

This column concerns the power of an RO1 grant from the federal government of the United States. To that end, a discussion of the philosophical viewpoints of power, the process of applying for federal grants, and a consideration of a more inclusive process will ensue.

Promoting a Culture of Civility in Nursing Learning Environments

BACKGROUND

Incivility in nursing education imperils the well-being of both faculty and students, is damaging to professional relationships, and hinders the exchange of knowledge in nursing learning environments. Because supportive, respectful learning environments foster students' ability to flourish and reach their highest potential, it is essential that open dialogue and relationship building in nursing education are as valued as content taught.

PURPOSE

This study explored strategies for promoting a culture of civility in nursing learning environments.

METHOD

A 9-item survey was used to gather insights from nurses (n = 441) about how incivility could be managed or prevented in order to promote a culture of civility.

RESULTS

The data revealed 2 major themes: personal action, and organization action.

CONCLUSION

Nursing faculty, students, and schools/programs can promote civility in nursing learning environments through establishing a power balance, effective communication, self-reflection, setting clear expectations early, and instituting consequences for violating a culture of civility.

"I Can't Breathe": Biopower in the Time of COVID-19: An Exploration of How Biopower Manifests in the Dual Pandemics of COVID and Racism

In this article, we apply Agamben's theory of biopower and other related concepts to the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States. We explore the similarities between the COVID-19 pandemic and the pandemic of racism. Concepts such as bios, zoe, homo sacer, and states of exception can be applied to understand inequities among marginalized communities in the COVID-19 pandemic. We recommend that nurses and health care workers use critical conscientization and structural competency to increase awareness and develop interventions to undo the injustices related to biopower faced by many in the COVID-19 pandemic.

A concept analysis of power

Using Walker and Avant's theory construction strategy, a concept analysis of power was conducted. Within the nursing literature, there exists a dialectic between types of power: power to vs. power over. This dialectic covers a wide range between goal attainment and powerlessness. The aim of this concept analysis was to examine power to for its potential fit with the phenomenon of nurses' lack of participation in professional organizations and on governing boards. The assumptions of this concept analysis are that power to is good, and that as humans with cognitive abilities, nurses have sufficient power to, whether they engage it or not. The Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature, Academic Search Premier, Business Source Elite, Google Scholar, ABI/INFORM Complete, Education Research Complete, Historical Abstracts, and PsychINFO were searched using the keywords power, nursing, and group. Peer-reviewed, scholarly journal articles from 1957 to 2019 were considered. The derived definition of power to is largely unchanged from its 17th century definition: the knowledge, freedom, and intention to do or to effect something. Self-assessing and nurturing knowledge, freedom, and intention, and identifying risk-preference among nurses may yield potential candidates for participation in professional nursing organizations and on governing boards.

School Discipline Experiences Among Youth With Disabilities From the Perspective of School Nurses

Youth with disabilities disproportionately experience harsh discipline. Exploring perspectives of behavior and discipline could increase inclusivity, yet school nurses' perspectives are unexplored. Using the Peace and Power Conceptual Model, school nurses' perspectives were explored employing secondary qualitative analysis using Thorne's typology of analytic expansion. Parent study included interviews with school nurses, 24 data files comprised the sample for secondary analysis. Three peace-power versus power-over themes emerged: "having discordant perspectives," "being mislabeled," and "placing at higher risks." School nurses are equipped to build healthy school communities through changes in discipline practices, policies, and understanding of how youth with disabilities are impacted.

Learning how to SMILE. Improving physical and mental health through nurse education and creative practice

The purpose of this pilot study was to explore how best to prepare and support nursing undergraduate students learning in a community/primary care setting through a Student Managed Initiatives in Lifestyle Education (SMILE) project. Further to this our intention was to evaluate the ways in which students were able to apply nursing theory to the practice of identifying and responding to the health needs of vulnerable people. Using a collaborative approach and a qualitative method, this pilot study used focus group discussions to explore both the experiences of community participants and undergraduate nursing students. This project found that students were able to draw on theoretical understandings and their simulated learning experiences to support their learning in a complex, non-clinical practice setting. It also illustrates the way in which community centres and other naturalistic environments where individuals and groups meet, can provide spontaneous and rewarding opportunities for nursing students to develop and apply health promoting knowledge and skills. Shaping nursing curricula with this in mind, creates the potential for nurses to make a significant contribution to improved health outcomes for vulnerable and/or marginalised people.

Cultivating Praxis Through Chinn and Kramer's Emancipatory Knowing

Nursing actions in support of equitable health and social relations have always been central to the work of our discipline. The mandate for social justice advocacy is identified in many of our professional and ethical frameworks, with systems-level advocacy situated as a core competency for advanced practice nurses. And yet, the sociopolitical processes that generate health inequities are not always readily understood by nurses. Emancipatory knowing provides an accessible lens to reveal how social injustice occurs while delineating a practical structure through which reflective action can be undertaken toward social change, otherwise known as nursing praxis.

A Theoretical Framework for Emancipatory Nursing With a Focus on Environment and Persons' Own and Shared Lifeworld

By giving a brief overview of the metaconcepts in nursing, with a focus on environment, we sketch a theoretical framework for an emancipatory perspective in nursing care practice. To meet the requirements of equality in care and treatment, we have in our theoretical framework added a critical lifeworld perspective to the antioppressive practice, to meet requirements of equity in health care encounter. The proposed model of emancipatory nursing goes from overall ideological structures to ontological aspects of the everyday world. Based on the model, nurses could identify what kind of theoretical critical knowledge and thinking they require to conduct equal care and encounter the person behind the patient role.

Embracing the Focus of the Discipline of Nursing: Critical Caring Pedagogy

PURPOSE

To present a theoretical model that grounds teaching and learning in nursing in the focus, values, and ideals of nursing as a discipline.

ORGANIZING CONSTRUCTS

The critical caring pedagogy model was formed by integrating Falk-Rafael's theory of critical caring in public health nursing, Noddings' philosophy of caring education, and Chinn's theory of peace and power.

METHODS

The model of critical caring pedagogy was developed by logical analysis of the three organizing constructs and the conceptual relationships between and among these constructs. The analysis was informed by the authors' experiences implementing the theoretical constructs in teaching and learning.

CONCLUSIONS

When nurse educators ground teaching and learning practice in nursing's own theoretical and philosophic foundation, they teach nursing in powerful ways that show nursing values and ideals through action, revealing deeper meanings of the words that form texts, lectures, and objectives set forth in a curriculum outline.

CLINICAL RELEVANCE

Nursing students who experience education that is grounded in nursing's own disciplinary focus acquire an appreciation of nursing's disciplinary knowledge grounded in experience, paving the way for grounding their eventual practice in nursing theoretical perspectives.

Thinking Upstream: A 25-Year Retrospective and Conceptual Model Aimed at Reducing Health Inequities

Thinking upstream was first introduced into the nursing vernacular in 1990 with the goal of advancing broad and context-rich perspectives of health. Initially invoked as conceptual framing language, upstream precepts were subsequently adopted and adapted by a generation of thoughtful nursing scholars. Their work reduced health inequities by redirecting actions further up etiologic pathways and by emphasizing economic, political, and environmental health determinants. US health care reform has fostered a much broader adoption of upstream language in policy documents. This article includes a semantic exploration of thinking upstream and a new model, the Butterfield Upstream Model for Population Health (BUMP Health).

School Nurses' Awareness and Attitudes Toward Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children

Human trafficking is a global, multibillion-dollar industry. Most victims are female and more than half are children. At-risk youth continue to attend school with school nurses on the frontline of this health crisis. Using the Peace and Power Conceptual Model, a mixed-methods study was conducted to explore school nurses' awareness, attitudes, and role perceptions in the prevention of commercial sexual exploitation of children. Six peace-power versus power-over power themes and 4 subthemes were identified: "exposure/knowledge, "collaboration," "role boundaries," and "creating respite space." Policy efforts should focus on improving practice conditions for school nurses to support the prevention of commercial sexual exploitation of children.

Critical caring theory and public health nursing advocacy for comprehensive sexual health education

Public health nurses (PHNs) often work with adolescent populations at risk for unplanned pregnancies who do not have access to comprehensive sexual health education (CSHE). Evidence-based CSHE can have a significant protective effect on adolescent sexual behaviors. This article applies critical caring theory to public health nursing advocacy for CSHE. Critical caring theory defines the social justice work of PHNs as an expression of their caring as nurses. The lack of CSHE in schools for adolescents is a social justice issue, and PHNs can be important advocates. The purpose of this article is to explore how critical caring theory can inform public health nursing practice regarding the importance of CSHE advocacy with the goal of creating equitable access to CSHE for all adolescents.

Elements of the socio-critical paradigm in nursing care practices: an integrative review

OBJECTIVE

Analyze the evidence available in Brazilian theses on the elements of the socio-critical paradigm in the construction of knowledge and practices of nursing care.

METHOD

An integrative literature review was carried out in the Theses Database of the Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel and the Brazilian Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations.

RESULTS

Of a total of 320 theses, only 19 had elements of the socio-critical paradigm in their construction, among which the use of participatory investigations stand out (especially action-research), which present interaction between the researcher and the participants, the use of data collection techniques such as focus groups and culture circles, and theoretical frameworks for analyzing the phenomena in their complexity.

CONCLUSION

The support of the sociocritical paradigm attributes to nursing the character of a practical science and service to the community, being committed to social transformation by empowering people.

The Peace and Power Conceptual Model: An Assessment Guide for School Nurses Regarding Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children

Human trafficking is a global problem; more than half of all victims are children. In the United States (US), at-risk youth continue to attend school. School nurses are on the frontlines, presenting a window of opportunity to identify and prevent exploitation. Available papers targeting school nurses report that school nurses may lack awareness of commercial sexual exploitation and may have attitudes and misperceptions about behaviors of school children at risk. This is a theoretical paper applying the Peace and Power Conceptual Model to understand the role of school nurses in commercial sexual exploitation of children.

The meaning of patient-nurse interaction for older women in healthcare settings: A Qualitative Descriptive Study

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES

The purpose of this study was to explore the meaning of patient-nurse interaction for older women receiving care in healthcare settings.

BACKGROUND

Older women are often overlooked or misunderstood by the nurses caring for them. Some research exists on nurses' perception of their interaction with patients, yet few studies have described the meaning of such interaction from the patients' perspective.

METHODS

This was a pilot study using qualitative description as a methodology. Data were filtered through a lens of critical feminist theory to interpret interactions taking place in healthcare settings that are often characterised by paternalism. Seven women between the ages of 66 and 81 were interviewed using a semi-structured guide.

RESULTS

Participants had a distinctive perspective on the experience of caring. Their expressions include stories of being cared for themselves by nurses as well as historical recalls of being the one-caring for family members. In these combined stories, the contrast between the nurses who held caring in primacy and those who were distinctly uncaring sheds light on the importance of cultivating a moral ideal of caring and respect for personhood.

CONCLUSION

A population of older women who potentially face disabling conditions must rely on direct, meaningful, interaction with nurses to successfully navigate the healthcare system. The findings suggest that these women did not have consistent access to such interaction.

IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE

The gathering and interpretation of new narratives about patient-nurse interaction for older women could lead to a deeper understanding of power and civility as it impacts a caring relationship. Further research using a theoretical lens of critical feminism has implications for improving healthcare delivery for older women worldwide.

Experiences of nursing students and educators during the co-construction of clinical nursing leadership learning activities: A qualitative research and development study

BACKGROUND

Student voice posits that students' unique perspectives on teaching and learning can be used in conjunction with those of educators to create meaningful educational activities.

OBJECTIVE

The study aimed to describe nursing students' and educators' experiences during the co-construction of educational activities involving clinical nursing leadership.

DESIGN

Qualitative research and development model.

SETTING

The study was conducted at a French-Canadian nursing faculty that provides a 3-year undergraduate program.

PARTICIPANTS

Five undergraduate nursing students, four nursing educators, and the principal investigator formed the co-construction team.

METHODS

Data collected included all documents (written and audio) related to the co-construction process: three 2-hour team meetings, PI's fieldnotes and a focus group discussion that occurred once the co-construction process was completed. Thematic analysis was performed guided by Paillé and Muchielli's (2010) method.

RESULTS

Data analysis revealed two interrelated themes: (1) unique, purposeful collaboration and (2) change that makes a difference. A space described as safe, without hierarchy and that included the "right" people helped the team achieve their objective of creating new educational activities on clinical nursing leadership. The two new learning activities developed by the team were perceived as useful for future nursing students. At the individual level, team members appreciated how co-construction helped them understand teaching and learning from new perspectives.

CONCLUSIONS

A structured, efficient co-construction process contributed to positive changes in the nursing program and participants. Additional research is required to enhance understanding of the factors that facilitate and hinder student-educator collaboration outside the classroom.

Exercising Nursing Essential and Effective Freedom in Behalf of Social Justice: A Humanizing Model

This article expands upon previous work by the authors to develop a model of nursing essential and effective freedom to facilitate nursing action in behalf of social justice. The article proposes that while social justice is rooted in nursing's ontological, epistemological, and moral foundations, the discipline's social justice mandate is constrained by its historical and contemporary location within an institutionalized medical paradigm. We present a model of nursing "essential" and "effective" freedom based on the philosophy of Bernard Lonergan to illustrate how nursing can transcend these barriers. This humanizing model is illustrated through personal narratives of the authors.