| Description |
The study was an attempt to further validate the Nurse-Psychiatric Patient Interaction Inventory (NPPII). The NPPII is an 18-item, empirically derived inventory designed to measure the extent to which a nurse can select potentially therapeutic verbal responses in nurse-psychiatric patient situations. In the original development in the inventory, baccalaureate nursing students performed significantly better than diploma or associated degree students on the inventory. This was interpreted as a very limited validity check.. A further validity check of the NPPI was measured in the present study by correlating scores on the NPPII with performance rating of a group of registered nurses who were employed on hospital psychiatric units. The performance ratings were scores on the Nurse Performance Description Scales (NPDS). During the first phase of the study, the NPPII was given to the nurses. During the second phase, the immediate supervisors of the subjects completed the NPDS as an evaluation of the nurse's overall nursing performance. The NPPII and the NPDS were expected to correlate highly on the assumption that the nurse who is effective in nurse-patient relationships with other people in the work situation, and would be judged a "good" nurse by her supervisor. Product moment correlations were calculated between the NPPII scores and the NPDS total and subscale scores. There was no tendency for high scorers on the NPPII to receive high NPDS ratings. When the ten high scorers and the ten low scorers on the NPDS were compared, the mean scores on the NPPII for these two groups were equal. Several possible explanations were offered for lack of expected correlations between the NPPII and the NPDS scores. The NPDS may not be an appropriate tool for evaluation of specific psychiatric nursing skills. Another explanation offered was that the lack of correlation may indicate that a nurse who is a potentially therapeutic force in nurse-patient interactions, as measured by the NPPII, is not necessarily an effective nurse in other important aspects of nursing. However, further research was recommended to determine the validity of the NPPII. Another possible reason for the lack of correlation was the rater error, "halo," which could have favored qualities other than those measured by the NPPII. Contrary to predictions, the associated program graduates had the highest mean score, followed by the baccalaureate and diploma program graduates. However, sample sizes were too small to make a meaningful comparison of the group means. |
