ATTITUDES OF STUDENTS OF THE COLLEGE FOR VOCATIONAL
STUDIES IN HEALTHCARE „MEDIKA“ REGARDING THE
NURSING PROFESSION

Background: Nursing is a recognizable profession, but due to numerous prejudices, there is a need to strengthen awareness of the values of the nursing profession, both on an individual and a social level.

Aim: This research aims to determine the attitudes of students at a college for vocational studies in healthcare toward the nursing profession, i.e. towards the roles and tasks of nurses/technicians, values in nursing, social stereotypes in nursing, professionalism, and characteristics of nurses/technicians.

Materials and Methods: The research sample included 50 students at the colleges for vocational studies in healthcare "Medika" from Belgrade, Loznica, and Kruševac. A questionnaire on sociodemographic characteristics and the Nursing Image Questionnaire (NIQ-7) were applied. Mann-Whitney U test and Kruskal-Wallis H test were used to test the differences between the median values in two and three
independent groups, respectively.

Results: We found a significantly more positive attitude towards nursing among the respondents aged 40 to 49 compared to younger categories of respondents (subscale „Social stereotypes towards nursing”; p=0.022;), those who were married compared to single or divorced („Social stereotypes towards nursing; p=0.019), and those who owned the apartment compared to those who lived with parents or rented the apartment (“Social stereotypes towards nursing”; p= 0.002; ; and “Characteristics of nurses / technicians”; p=0.015; )

Conclusion: We show that there is a positive correlation between older age, marriage and socio-economic status and the students’ attitudes towards nursing profession. Further studies on this topic may contribute to the improvement of the quality and efficacy of nursing studies.