Relationship between social support and stress in accelerated nursing students

Abstract

<p>Nursing program attrition rates and retention rates in the first year of professional practice are excessive due to stress. Investigating through this quantitative, correlative research study is due to the lack of information related to accelerated students and stress. Theories framing this study, the Transactional Model of Stress and Coping, and Triadic Reciprocal Determinism Theory, posit that the environment, whether internal or external, affects stress reactions. The research questions included relationships of Significant Other Support, Family Support, and Friend Support to Perceived Stress Score in a two-part online survey of 116 United States participants. Mechanical Turk located the participants and all demographics, informed consent, and the two-part survey were housed on Qualtrics. Results showed acceptable internal consistency. Significant Other Support Cronbach alpha = .74, Family Support = .78, Friend Support = .68, and Perceived Stress Scale = .78. Based on an alpha of 0.05, Pearson r found a significant positive correlation between Significant Other and Perceived Stress Scale,<em> r</em> (116) = 0.38, <em>p </em>&lt; .001, 95% CI [0.21, 0.53], Family Support and Perceived Stress Score, <em>r </em>(116)= 0.39, p &lt; .001, 95% CI [0.23, 0.54], and Friend Support and Perceived Stress Scale, <em>r</em> (116) = 0.31, <em>p</em> &lt; .001, 95% CI [0.14, 0.47]. The three alternative hypotheses were supported and nulls rejected. However, the statistically significant correlations were positive, not inverse, to stress. The positive correlation meant that when social support increased, stress increased, not supported by traditional nursing program literature.</p>