Nursing students making sense and meaning of norm-criticism in a campus-based clinical learning environment: A...

Nursing education institutions have sought to incorporate health equity and social justice into curricula. However, nursing students report limited opportunities to engage with these perspectives during their studies. In a campus-based clinical learning environment, efforts have been made to support students in the advancement of health equity and social justice by integrating a norm-critical approach.

This study aimed to explore how nursing students made sense of norm-criticism in a campus-based clinical learning environment.

The design of the study was qualitative, informed by narrative inquiry and a Goffmanian theoretical framework.

The study was carried out in a campus-based clinical learning environment for nursing education in a mid-sized university college.

The participants of the study consist of 14 undergraduate nursing students.

This study adopted a narrative methodology where the data was analyzed both structurally and thematically.

This study demonstrates that students made sense of norm-criticism by framing it in three distinct phases. First, students encounter norm-criticism through norm-critical photographs, then they engage in critical reflection on norm-criticism, both in collaboration with peers and through personal reflection on their own positionality, and lastly, they find meaning in norm-criticism as a tool to change unequal nursing practices and provide person-centered nursing care.

This study highlights that, by mechanisms of impression management and reframing, nursing students regard and use norm-criticism as a reflective tool that empowers them to change healthcare structures and supports them in understanding how to provide person-centered care.