METHODS: Fifteen hundreds and seventy seven nursing faculty randomly sampled in Japan were asked to answer the following two instruments. The Professional Activities Scale for Nursing Faculty (PAS) (Yamashita, 2004) was used to measure the quality of professional activities of nursing faculty. The items of the PAS describe the ideal professional activities of nursing faculty as identified by a qualitative study (Murakami, 2002), and participants rated the degree of achievement for them. It had 30 items, 4-point Likert-type scale (from 1 "always perform" to 4 "Almost never perform"), then the possible score range was from 30.0 to 150.0. The items were grouped into 6 subscales, each had 5 items, then the possible score range was from 4 to 20. The scale had well-established internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha=. 946), and construct validity was established by factor analysis. The Questionnaire for Faculty's Attributes (QFA) was used to collect the demographic data of nursing faculty. Content validity was established by a pilot study and an expert panel. The data were analyzed statistically.

FINDINGS: The mean score of the PAS was 73.1(SD=15.7), and that of each subscale was as follows; (1) create quality teaching-learning process (mean=11.2,SD=2.9), (2) conduct research and reduce the findings for people (mean=15.6, SD=4.3), (3) play various roles to achieve organizational goals" (mean=10.5, SD=3.0), (4) continue learning to improve professional competence (mean=11.5, SD=3.2), (5) behave autonomously based on one's belief (mean=11.3, SD=3.1), (6) promote the progress of junior partners (mean=13.1, SD=4.0)".

IMPLICATIONS: The results suggested that the nursing faculty in Japan perceived they didn't always perform adequately in the job, and especially they need improvement of conducting research and reducing the findings for people. The programs related to research should be provided for nursing faculty in continuing education.