Workplace bullying (WB) among nurses is a prevalent and serious problem in health care settings around the world with detrimental physical, psychological and organizational consequences. WB includes behaviours such as verbal abuse or threats of harm, continual criticism, demeaning remarks, intimidation and undermining, as well as more subtle behaviours such as refusing to cooperate, being unavailable to give assistance, hampering another's performance and making their work difficult. Including education on workplace bullying is highly recommended in nursing curricula. Moreover, the Canadian Nurses Association and the Canadian Federation of Nurses Unions strongly support violence-free workplaces.
Although workplace bullying is one of the biggest challenges that the nursing profession faces today, there is a scarceness of interventional research aimed at educating nursing students on effective and appropriate responses to WB. This study aims to evaluate the effectiveness of an online evidence-based educational intervention in enhancing knowledge about workplace bullying and in improving self-efficacy related to workplace bullying among undergraduate nursing students in two Canadian schools of nursing. The content of the modules was developed from a review of the literature and guided by critical social theory and cognitive social learning theory.
The first module includes information to introduce the topic of WB including definition, descriptions of acts and sources of bullying as well as its antecedents and consequences on personal health, patient safety, and healthcare organizations. The primary goal is to raise nursing students' awareness of WB. In the second module, information about nursing students' and nurses' legal rights and responsibilities with relation WB is provided. Then, it describes strategies to address and manage bullying acts in the workplace. The goal of the module is to educate nursing students about how to intervene when witnessing or experiencing WB. The third module involves five practice scenarios to further facilitate nursing students' abilities to implement the strategies they learned in the previous modules to identify and manage bullying acts. Each scenario encompasses a nurse or a nursing student in a WB situation. In this module, the end goal is to increase efficacy beliefs among all participants about their ability to identify and manage bullying in the workplace.
Methods:
The study design is quasi-experimental, using a one group pre-test/post-test to assess the outcomes of the online educational intervention. Third and fourth year undergraduate nursing students at two Canadian schools of nursing will be invited to participate. The measurement tools include a socio-demographic questionnaire, the Self-Efficacy to Respond to Disruptive Behaviours (SERDB) Questionnaire and WB knowledge assessment test.
Results:
This is an ongoing study.
Conclusion:
This study will add a substantive contribution to current nursing knowledge by developing and evaluating an innovative evidence-based educational tool to educate and prepare nursing students about workplace bullying. Specifically, the online educational tool will include information about how to identify and manage workplace bullying situations along with case studies. Evaluating the effectiveness of the online educational intervention is important in discerning its future applicability in undergraduate nursing curricula.