How narrative nursing pedagogy and GenAI-assisted learning work together: A qualitative process evaluation of a...

Integrating humanistic care with emerging technologies is a pressing challenge in nursing education. Narrative nursing pedagogy and generative artificial intelligence (GenAI)-assisted learning represent two potentially complementary approaches, yet their integration mechanism in clinical nursing education remains unexplored.

To examine how narrative nursing pedagogy and GenAI-assisted learning can be integrated in an obstetrics and gynecology nursing course, and to understand the mechanisms through which this integration generates educational value from the perspective of undergraduate students.

We embedded a qualitative process evaluation within a larger complex educational intervention. Six focus group interviews were conducted with 60 purposively sampled undergraduate nursing students who participated in a four-step integrated teaching model. Data were analysed using inductive, semantic-level reflexive thematic analysis, informed by Kolb's Experiential Learning Cycle.

One overarching theme - "Mutually Grounding, Mutually Expanding" - and four interrelated themes were identified. Narrative nursing pedagogy grounded GenAI-assisted inquiry in patients' contexts, constraining unfocused information retrieval and providing evaluative standards, while GenAI expanded students' understanding of patient narratives by supporting knowledge construction and clinical reasoning. Their reciprocal interaction generated synergistic learning, enabling students to move between contextualised experience and abstract knowledge, supporting critical evaluation and helping students recognise the risks of over-reliance on GenAI. Remaining challenges included insufficient narrative skills, GenAI's inherent limitations in affective and domain-specific nursing contexts, and tendencies toward imbalanced method use.

The integration functions as a grounding-expansion mechanism within the experiential learning cycle, where narrative contextualises GenAI use and GenAI-assisted learning extends narrative interpretation. This mechanism conceptualises GenAI as an epistemic partner rather than a mere tool, while underscoring the need for structured pedagogy and educator guidance.