Body awareness and secondary traumatic stress among emergency nurses: A mixed-methods study

Emergency nurses are routinely exposed to workplace trauma, placing them at increased risk of secondary traumatic stress. Although body awareness has been proposed as a potential coping resource for stress regulation, its role in relation to secondary traumatic stress remains poorly understood.

To examine the association between body awareness and secondary traumatic stress among emergency nurses and to explore how body awareness is experienced and used as a coping resource to workplace trauma.

100 emergency nurses completed the Multidimensional Assessment of Interoceptive Awareness and the Secondary Traumatic Stress Scale . Descriptive statistics, correlation analysis, and multiple linear regression were used to examine relationships between body awareness and trauma. Semi-structured interviews were conducted of nine nurses and analyzed using thematic analysis.

Most emergency nurses reported moderate levels of body awareness and moderate to high levels of secondary traumatic stress. No statistically significant association was found between body awareness and secondary traumatic stress, and body awareness did not predict trauma levels in regression analysis. Gender emerged as a significant predictor, with male nurses reporting lower secondary traumatic stress scores. Four themes emerged: listening to the body, mind-body disconnection, body awareness as a coping tool and workplace culture and barriers..

Body awareness did not demonstrate a direct protective effect against secondary traumatic stress, qualitative findings suggest that it functions as an important situational coping resource . This highlights the need for trauma-informed approaches that integrate individual body-based coping strategies with supportive workplace environments.