The sense of coherence among nurse educators in Finland

In his salutogenic model, Antonovsky defines the sense of coherence (SOC) as a personality dimension which is hypothesized to facilitate stress management and to contribute to overall well-being. The SOC scores of Finnish nurse educators were determined using the 13-item version of the SOC questionnaire. Questionnaires were sent to 706 Finnish nurse educators, and data from 477 (68%) educators were analysed. The mean score of respondents' SOC was 66.9 (SD 0.47, range 34-88). Cronbach's alpha was 0.81. The SOC was lower among older respondents. The more freedom individuals had to choose their teaching field, the higher the SOC. Thus, although age explained a significant proportion of variance, its contribution to the total proportion of variance explained was quantitatively less important than that of freedom to choose duties. Other background data were not related to SOC. There was a significant positive relationship between the SOC score and the opinions of nurse educators about interaction in the working community, joy of work, workload, negative stress, symptoms of diseases, atmosphere in the college, evaluation of own competence, balance between work and leisure time, own health, and use of drugs.