Metaphorical perceptions of nursing students toward sexuality during pregnancy: An example of metaphor analysis

Pregnancy is one of the periods of life in which women's sexuality is negatively affected by the cultural structure of society and false beliefs. Determining the perspectives of nurse candidates on sexuality during pregnancy will contribute to the training of nurses who will be able to evaluate sexuality and provide holistic health care in the future.

This study aims to describe the metaphorical perceptions of nursing students toward sexuality during pregnancy through metaphors.

A metaphor analysis technique based on phenomenological method.

This study was conducted with 317 nursing students in Turkey. The study data were collected with questionnaire form prepared by the researchers between January and February 2024. In the first part of the questionnaire, questions about socio-demographic characteristics were included, and in the second part, the sentence "Sexuality during pregnancy is like., because." was included to determine the metaphors developed by the students about sexuality during pregnancy. The 317 valid metaphors revealing the students' perceptions of the concept of sexuality during pregnancy were grouped under 3 categories; "Creating danger and causing harm", "Need/necessity or usual", and "Unnecessary, wrong or should not be".

In the study, students provided metaphors containing both positive and negative concepts related to sexuality during pregnancy. However, the majority of the metaphors produced contain negative concepts. It is recommended that a sexuality/sexual health course covering sexuality and nursing care in different life periods such as pregnancy be added to the nursing education curriculum in order to determine the perspectives of nursing candidates on pregnancy sexuality, to make them aware of their attitudes and beliefs, and to ensure that they are prepared for the situations they may encounter in health care after graduation.