Independent Thinking in Nursing: An Archaeology of Knowledge Perspective

The topic of thinking was not widely discussed in nursing literature until the 1960s. At that time, the nursing process entered nursing literature, and later, in the 1980s, critical thinking began to be examined. Critical thinking had been talked about in fields other than nursing since at least the time of educational philosopher John Dewey.

Using Foucault's Archaeology of Knowledge as a model, this article explores how and why thinking became an object of nursing discourse.

Modern nursing discourse emphasizes independent thinking in contrast to the discussion of comportment, attitudes, and observation found in the early nursing literature.

The emergence of thinking discourse in nursing was a response to changes in health care that began in the period after World War II and although this discourse ostensibly serves to liberate nurses' thinking, it can actually serve to regulate the thinking of students and nurses. [.