Nursing student caring behaviors during blood pressure measurement.

The purpose of this multisite, nonexperimental study was to examine, using a repeated measures design, the effects of a teaching intervention designed to promote caring behaviors as students learn the psychomotor skill of blood pressure measurement. Watson's theory of human caring and a combination of cognitive and connectionist learning theories were used as the organizing construct. Baccalaureate nursing student participants were videotaped and evaluated at two points in time while performing the psychomotor skill of blood pressure measurement on a role-player. Role-players rated the students' caring behaviors using the Role Player Survey of Caring Behaviors During Blood Pressure Measurement instrument. Between these data collection points, students learned about caring behaviors through analysis of a videotaped role-play and required readings. An evaluator randomly selected 10 student videotapes from each of the 6 baccalaureate nursing program study sites and noted the presence or absence of caring behaviors on the Caring Behaviors During Blood Pressure Measurement instrument. Pretest and posttest scores on both subjective and objective research instruments were compared using descriptive statistics and repeated measures analysis of variance (ANOVA). Students demonstrated a significant improvement in objective and subjective caring behaviors between the two performance examinations. The findings support further investigation of teaching interventions to promote the development of caring behaviors during nursing psychomotor skill development.