Nursing Doctoral Students and Perceptions of Faculty Support as a Predictor for Intent to Leave

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to identify nursing doctoral students’ perceived stress, related to perceptions of faculty support, and intent to leave their doctoral program of study. Research questions regarding if students’ perceptions of faculty support impacted their report of stress, and if higher perceptions of faculty support reduced students’ intent to leave their program of study were analyzed. While current measures indicate that the profession of nursing has met the Institute of Medicine’s (2011) call to double the number of doctorally prepared nurses, there is still a critical shortage of nursing faculty within the U.S. (AACN, 2019). Recent studies of doctoral students indicate relationships between faculty and students can have an impact on the attrition and persistence of doctoral students (Hunter & Devine, 2016; Litalien & Guay, 2015; Litalien, Guay, & Morin, 2015; Schmidt & Hansson, 2018; Volkert, Candela, & Bernacki, 2018; Yarwood-Ross & Haigh, 2014) and whether students successfully complete their programs of study.

Methods: A 38-question survey, containing Shelton’s (2003) Perceived Faculty Support Scale, Cohen’s (2012) Perceived Stress Scale, Volkert et al. (2018) intent to leave questions, and an 11-question demographic survey, was emailed via Qualtrics to Deans and Directors of Graduate Schools of Nursing, across the United States. Deans were asked to forward the survey to students currently enrolled in nursing doctoral programs, with a total of 357 students fully completed the survey.

Results: Inferential analyses determined statistically significant differences. Online participants reported significantly less stress than hybrid and on-campus participants. Participants enrolled in on-campus programs reported a higher intent to leave than participants enrolled in online programs. Participants in online programs reported higher support than those enrolled in hybrid and on-campus programs. Participants in the dissertation stage of the program reported a lower intent to leave and participants with management responsibilities in their jobs reported higher functional support from faculty than those without management responsibilities. No differences were found between or among other demographic variables. A small, but statistically significant negative correlation was found between years as nurse and stress. As age and years as a nurse increased, stress decreased while participants’ scores on psychological and functional support from faculty increased.

Conclusion: Students on-campus appear more stressed than their online counterparts and their perceptions of faculty support are lower. This finding is not limited to either PhD or DNP programs, as on-campus participants are split evenly between these two types of program. Therefore, more research is needed to find out how to provide better support for these on-campus students. The AACN recommends students should enter doctoral study full-time rather than part-time and earlier in their careers than previously was common for the field. This study demonstrated that the more experienced students are, including both age and years as a nurse, there appears to be an increased perception of faculty support. More research is needed to understand this finding, also to determine how to build support for students who are younger and/or have less experience as a nurse.