Nursing Students' Attitudes Toward Technology: Multicenter Cross-Sectional Study.

Area of Science:

• Nursing Education
• Health Informatics
• Digital Health

Background:

• Increasing digital technology in healthcare necessitates informatics proficiency among health professionals.
• Nursing education must prepare students for technology use in clinical settings.
• Assessing student attitudes toward technology is key to identifying proficiency needs.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate nursing students' attitudes, specifically enthusiasm and anxiety, toward technology.
• To identify factors associated with these attitudes among nursing students.

Main Methods:

• A questionnaire was administered to 646 nursing students across universities in Sweden and Poland.
• Data collected included attitudes toward technology, eHealth literacy, electronic device skills, and sociodemographic information.
• Statistical analyses included descriptive statistics, Spearman rank correlation, and Mann-Whitney U test.

Main Results:

• Students generally exhibited high technology enthusiasm (mean score 3.83) and moderate technology anxiety (mean score 2.48).
• Technology enthusiasm correlated positively with eHealth literacy and perceived device skills, and negatively with age in the Swedish sample.
• Technology anxiety correlated negatively with eHealth literacy and perceived device skills, and positively with age in the Swedish sample. Female students in Sweden reported higher technology anxiety.

Conclusions:

• Nursing students demonstrate a nuanced attitude toward technology, with enthusiasm tempered by some anxiety.
• eHealth literacy and perceived device skills are significant positive correlates of enthusiasm and negative correlates of anxiety.
• Integrating health technology topics into nursing curricula is essential for preparing future professionals for a digitally evolving healthcare landscape.