Abstract

The United States is currently facing an unprecedented nursing shortage. The current shortage is being driven by much broader factors than previous shortages (Kimball & O'Neil, 2002). Efforts to deal with this impending crisis have focused on recruiting individuals into nursing with very little attention paid to retention. Job conflict among staff nurses has a significant inverse relationship with the level of job satisfaction (Gardner, 1992). Few research studies have examined the nature of conflict in nursing.

This case study sought to identify and describe the experiences of registered nurses in an acute care medical-surgical setting in order to identify potential sources of conflict. Gerald Farrell's (1996, 1997, 1999, 2001) conceptual model of conflict in nursing was used as the framework. Farrell determined that three levels of conflict can be offered to account for conflict in nursing—a macrolevel, which focuses on nurses' relationships with dominant groups; a mesolevel, which concentrates on organizational structures, including workplace practices; and a microlevel, which emphasizes the interactional nature of conflict. The findings showed the most upsetting conflicts for registered nurses on the medical-surgical units occurs at the mesolevel. These conflicts were related to staffing mix and models of care. Based on the data, Farrell's model of conflict was refined. Rather than viewing Farrell's three categories of conflict as discrete, they can be viewed on a continuum with conflicts in one category triggering conflicts in another.

Description

This dissertation has also been disseminated through the ProQuest Dissertations and Theses database. Dissertation/thesis number: 3314553; ProQuest document ID: 304835350. The author still retains copyright.

Author Details

Susan J. Stocker, PhD, MSN

Sigma Membership

Delta Xi

Type

Dissertation

Format Type

Text-based Document

Study Design/Type

Case Study/Series

Research Approach

Qualitative Research

Keywords:

Workplace Conflict, Job Satisfaction, Nurse Retention, Medical Surgical Units

Advisor

Nancy Padak

Second Advisor

William Bintz

Third Advisor

Ruth Ludwick

Degree

PhD

Degree Grantor

Kent State University

Degree Year

2007

Rights Holder

All rights reserved by the author(s) and/or publisher(s) listed in this item record unless relinquished in whole or part by a rights notation or a Creative Commons License present in this item record.

All permission requests should be directed accordingly and not to the Sigma Repository.

All submitting authors or publishers have affirmed that when using material in their work where they do not own copyright, they have obtained permission of the copyright holder prior to submission and the rights holder has been acknowledged as necessary.

Review Type

None: Degree-based Submission

Acquisition

Proxy-submission

Date of Issue

2021-12-16

Full Text of Presentation

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