Relationship between Sense of Coherence and Stress Coping Strategy in Nursing Students

Changes Before and After Clinical Training

Abstract

The aim of this study was to clarify differences in sense of coherence (SOC) beforeand after clinical training and differences in stress coping strategies between groups withhigh and low SOC, assuming that there are differences in the process of SOC formationdepending on the strength of SOC. The subjects were third-year students in a three-yearcourse at a nursing vocational school. SOC, TAC-24, and STAI were measured before andafter clinical training in the final stage of basic nursing education, and the relationshipsbetween trends in students in the high and low SOC groups and anxiety trends and stresscoping strategies were investigated. It was found that although students in the low SOCgroup tended to be constantly susceptible to stress, their SOC score rose after the clinicaltraining (t(12)=-4.00, p<.01). In addition, while the low SOC group tended not to activelyuse stress coping strategies before the clinical training, after the training a tendency was seenfor the low SOC students to flexibly select coping strategies, similar to the high SOC group.