An Exploratory Study On Training Objectivities Of Nursing Doctoral Education In China

Nursing doctoral education is the highest level of nursing education throughout the world.Its quality is one of the important indicators of the degree and the level of development, thepotential, and the prospect of higher nursing education for a country. According to someresearches, in a country where nursing doctoral education began late, nursing disciplinedeveloped slowly too. Some experts even consider that how to train nursing doctoral studentsis the most serious problem faced by nursing education currently.Training objectivities refer to the specific requirements for quality training of varioustypes and levels of educational institutions or majors. Once the training objectivities havebeen defined, all educational activities to be undertaken should serve the purpose of achievingthem. As a theoretical guide of practical activity of education, training objectivities determineits nature, forms, content, and direction. So, different training objectivities will lead todifferent educational forms, content, methods and evaluation among educational institutionsor majors. In nursing education, training objectivities refer to the specific quality requirementof nursing training, which is the starting point and end-result of all nursing educationalactivities. Setting a scientific and reasonable objectivities according to actual needs is aprerequisite for carrying out nursing educational activities, which can provide developmentdirection and evaluation standard on them.An overall view of history of nursing doctoral education in mainland China reveals thatthe enrolment of nursing doctoral students started in2004. Although it begins late, it showsfast development trend and large development space, and by2010there are more than20universities that have offered nursing doctoral programs. However there are still lots ofimperfections, especially in the aspect of training objectivities, which is far from operable,specialised, standardised, normalised and hierarchical, and each institution established theirown system, and the specific quality requirement of training is still unclear.By means of literature review, this paper studies the status in quo of nursing doctoraleducation both in China and American, and explores its development tendency and some problems confronted by it. Based on this, in-depth interview was used to understand trainingneeds of nursing doctoral education from multiple aspects including learner, nursing expertsand physicians, and the role location, fundamental competence and training requirements ofnursing doctorate were established initially, which were eventually verified, predicted, andfiltered by experts using Delphi method. Thus, the positioning of training objectivities ofnursing doctoral education in China was defined. According to results of theoretical analysisof training objectivities, such as definition, nature, elements, structure, etc., and following itsrelative pathway of theoretical generalization, this paper, from the specific qualityrequirement of training, finally concluded training objectivities of two-type nursing doctoraldegree, i.e., scientific degree and professional degree, in China, which provide a theoreticalbasis for the development of nursing doctoral education in China.This paper consists of five parts, which are shown as follows:Part One: Theoretical basis and research planIn this part, theoretical basis of the research and problems to be solved were elaboratedupon. The purpose, the content and the method of the study were also described, and relatedconcepts and terms were defined, and research ideas and clues were introduced, whichfollowed the pathway of question-finding, hypotheses-proposing, data-supporting, andtheoretical generalization. Approaches applied in this study were comprehensively utilized,which include literature analysis, in-depth interview, Delphi technique and theoretical analysismethod.Part Two: Study on developing process of nursing doctoral education in the UnitedStates and in ChinaFrom the global perspective, nursing doctoral education is a history of mutual learning,reference and integration, and an exchange among nations. It is also an adaptive process withpolitical, economic, and cultural situation of each country or region. Its degree ofdevelopment is variable in different periods of history and in different country. In this part, theUnited States was chosen to be a reference, whose nursing doctoral education comparativelyhas a long history, and is well-developed, and high-quality. Through combing the status quoand the development trend of nursing doctoral education between the United States and China, this part tried to identify its law of development, influential factors, and the developmenttrend,, so as to provide the basis for systematic and deep study of its training objectivities.Based on the result of comparative analysis, this part identified three problems to besolved urgently in China: training objectivities, fundamental competence requirement, andcurriculum setting. The United States has ample experiences in solving these problems;however because of different cultural and educational background, medical policy, anddevelopment situation of nursing discipline, it is not possible for us to follow their experiencedirectly. Therefore, how to learn from the process of nursing doctoral education in the UnitedStates, and based on our current situation and actual demand, locating precisely the trainingobjectivities, developing the fundamental competence, and furthermore establishing thescientific, systematic, and professional characteristic curriculum system, are main problemsbeing faced by Chinese nursing doctoral education.Part Three: Study on training needs of nursing doctoral education in ChinaTraining objectivities are the statements of the final goals to be achieved by education.To establish the training objectivities, requirements of the profession must be analyzed, andneeds of society addressed, and on this basis, fundamental competencies put forward, fromwhich the training objectivities are gradually to be summarized. Therefore, in order to developtraining objectives, understanding requirements of the profession and society becomes reallynecessary. In this part, an in-depth interview was conducted to explore and then describe thetraining needs of the nursing profession and social needs from the perspective of learners, thenursing discipline (mainly from nursing experts including collegial experts, clinical expertsand clinical managers), and society (mainly from the perspective of the cooperation betweendoctors and nurses), and fundamental competence required by nursing doctorate was initiallyconstructed, which provided basis for the establishment of the training objectivities.According to the results of the interview, the positioning of training objectivities and theframe of competence of nursing doctorate were identified preliminarily, and the followingopinions were put forward: firstly, the location of the training objectivities should bediversified so as to meet the multifarious needs of society and the nursing discipline fortalents, and the diversity of expectation of learners on practice areas. Secondly, the trainingobjectivities should be pluralistic. Different types of nursing doctorate should have different emphasis during education so as to meet the diverse requirement of different practice areas.Thirdly, the training objectivities of nursing doctoral education should focus on theimprovement of comprehensive quality of nursing doctorate. As the highest level of nursingeducation, the most important task of nursing doctoral education is to cultivate high-levelnursing talents, who should be on the top level not only in the structure of nursing education,but also in knowledge, competence, and quality. Compared with holders of a bachelor'sdegree and a master's in nursing, they should show higher scientific research competence,practical competence, and comprehensive quality, and have the ability to lead thedevelopment of the nursing discipline and the nursing profession. Finally, the achievement oftraining objectivities of nursing doctoral education needs to strengthen the construction ofrelated condition, including supervision, academic team, and curriculum system.Part Four: Study on location of training objectivities of nursing doctoral educationin ChinaBased on the above results of literary analysis and in-depth interview, this part willfurther test, predict, and sift from the preliminarily constructed competence and the locationof training objectivities using Delphi method, and identify nursing doctorate's role location,function, and the specific requirement of fundamental competence and knowledge system, soas to provide the basis for further analyzing, concluding, and extracting the trainingobjectivities of nursing doctoral education in China.The result of this part demonstrates that nursing doctorate between the two types ofdoctoral degree should have different roles to play and different functions to perform. Nursingdoctorate with scientific degree should mainly undertake roles of nursing researcher andnursing educator, and mainly perform the research on nursing theory and nursing education,teaching task in college, theoretical guidance to nursing practice, and function of academicleaders. While nursing doctorate with professional degree should mainly undertake roles ofnursing practitioner and nursing educator, and mainly perform specialized nursing care,practice research, solving problematic issues, practice improvement, health education, andemergency care etc. Competence and knowledge requirements of nursing doctorate with thetwo types' degree contain areas in nursing research, practice, teaching, management,professional development, and self development, but their emphases are different. Nursing doctorate with scientific degree should possess more competence and knowledge in teachingareas, while nursing doctorate with professional degree should possess more competence andknowledge in areas of practice and management, and they have much in common in areas ofresearch, professional development, and self development. Therefore, the location of trainingobjectivities for the two types nursing doctorate should be alike in areas of research,professional development, and self development, and should be different in areas of teaching,practice, and management.Part Five: Theoretical summarization of training objectivities of nursing doctoraleducation in China.Through theoretical analysis on the elements, structure, characteristic of trainingobjectivities, this part further identified the policy, theory, and reality basis, integrated theresults of the aforementioned studies, followed the principle and pathway of theoreticalsummarization of training objectivities, analyzed the requirement of knowledge, competence,and quality of nursing doctorate. Finally, the training objectivities of nursing doctoraleducation in China were summarized.However, nursing doctoral education in China is still at the starting stage, and its trainingobjectivities are all at an exploratory stage for nursing colleges. Besides, the trainingobjectivities themselves have the characters of complexity and dynamics which can changewith the development of the nursing discipline and society. So, it is necessary for nursingeducators to make dynamic adjustments continuously. This study is just a pilot one which willbe tested by the practice.