Effect of Integrated Reflective Therapeutic Communication Report on Improving Nurse Student’s Reflection

Abstract

This quasi-experimental research aimed to examine the effectiveness among three method therapeutic communication report writing: general therapeutic communication report writing, reflective therapeutic communication report writing, and integrating therapeutic communication report writing. The study was undertaken during practice in subject “Nursing Care of Persons with Mental illness”. The subjects were 50 third-year nurse students, first group were sampling to general therapeutic communication report writing, the second were sampling to reflective therapeutic communication report writing, and the third were sampling to integrating therapeutic communication report writing. Research instruments were; 1) guide line for three method therapeutic communication report writing; and 2) the scale of reflective behaviors with the Cronbach’s alpha coefficients of .92. The intervention was implemented and the data were collected from January to February 2014. Statistics used for data analysis were paired t-test, one-way ANOVA, and multiple comparison by Scheffé method.

The findings reveal that, after engaging in three method therapeutic communication report writing; 1) three groups of nurse students reported significant increase in reflective behaviors (t = 8.381,

p < .001; t = 11.184, p < .001 and t = 12.363, p < .001, respectively); and 2) the third group of nurse students reported a more score of reflective behaviors than the first group (MD = .38, p < .05).

This study suggested that nurse educators should use guide line of integrating therapeutic communication report writing to enhance students’ reflection skills.