Abstract

Attentive presence involves a vigorous rhythmical flow of relating to another, it makes explicit that the other is cherished, and it is inextricably related to the way people make choices about what is important. It is a universal lived experience that is important to health and quality of life. The purposes of this research were to identify the structure of the lived experience of being attentively present to another and to contribute to knowledge about human becoming, the nursing theory that guided this study. Participants included 11 families whose members ranged in age from 7 to 81 years. These family members were persons living in the community who were willing to share their experience of being attentively present to another with the researcher during dialogical engagement. The Parse research method was used to answer the research question: What is the structure of the lived experience of being attentively present to another? The processes of dialogical engagement, extraction-synthesis, and heuristic interpretation were used for data gathering and analysis. The central finding of this study is the structure: The lived experience of being attentively present to another is penetrating engaging, as shifting with the cherished arises with quieting-disquieting regard. This structure is comprised of three core concepts, penetrating engaging, shifting with the cherished, and quieting-disquieting regard. These core concepts reflect the unitary experience of being attentively present to another for the participants in this study. Using the participants' descriptions, the findings are discussed in relation to how they enhance understanding about human becoming and in relation to how they can inform future research and practice.

Description

This dissertation has also been disseminated through the ProQuest Dissertations and Theses database. Dissertation/thesis number: 3056410; ProQuest document ID: 275680253. The author still retains copyright.

Author Details

Karen A. Carroll, PhD, RN, NEA-BC

Sigma Membership

Alpha Beta

Type

Dissertation

Format Type

Text-based Document

Study Design/Type

Other

Research Approach

Other

Keywords:

Relating to Others, Quality of Life, Being Attentively Present, Nursing Theory

Advisors

Parse, Rosemarie R.,Velsor-Friedrich, Barbara

Degree

PhD

Degree Grantor

Loyola University Chicago

Degree Year

2002

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

2023-04-21

Full Text of Presentation

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