Logically, how nurses approach research use should be driven strongly by the nature of their knowledge sources. In the nursing literature, researchers traditionally promote the importance of reading academic journals and continuing education to increase research use. However, disconnect exists between what researchers measure/explore as indicators of research use and what drives actual use. Researchers' perception of what constitutes "ideal" sources for disseminating research often differs greatly from the sources preferred by nurses in practice. Findings from various empirical studies show that nurses prefer social mediums to "academic" mediums (Baessler, 1994; Estabrooks, 1999). Using an ethnographic approach, narrative data from five pediatric and two adult surgical units in Toronto and Edmonton were obtained. The objective of the study is to: a) define overall themes related to sources of knowledge from narrative data, b) create a taxonomy of sources, c) profile each unit's sources of knowledge structure and patterns, and d) describe a common structure of knowledge sources. Across the seven units, it is evident that nurses prefer to use knowledge gained through social interaction rather than knowledge gained through more traditional academic mediums. These findings are consistent with quantitative data gathered from the same seven units.
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