NURS 8110: Theoretical and Scientific Foundations for Nursing Practice | Week 3

This week examines concept development and analysis, which, along with theory, is a critical aspect of nursing research.

Whether a concept (also called phenomena) is abstract or more concrete, it exists within a particular context and may be interpreted in multiple ways. Clarifying or generating a shared understanding of what a particular concept is or means is therefore vitally important. As such, you will apply this approach to a research topic relevant to your nursing practice, and evaluate the steps in this process as demonstrated in a research article.

Learning Objectives

Students will:

• Apply concept analysis to a practice problem
• Analyze the steps in concept development and analysis as demonstrated in a research article

Learning Resources

Note: To access this week’s required library resources, please click on the link to the Course Readings List, found in the Course Materials section of your Syllabus.

Required Readings

McEwin, M., & Wills, E. M. (2019). Theoretical basis for nursing. (5th ed.) Philadelphia, PA: Wolters Kluwer Health.

• Chapter 3, “Concept Development: Clarifying Meaning of Terms”Chapter 3 explains the process of concept development and discusses its application to theory development and research.

Gray, J.R., Grove, S.K., & Sutherland, S. (2017). Burns and Grove’s the practice of nursing research: Appraisal, synthesis, and generation of evidence (8th ed.). St. Louis, MO: Saunders Elsevier.

• Chapter 8, “Frameworks”Chapter 8 examines concepts and relational statements, how theories relate to concepts, and how to use conceptual maps to visually illustrate the interrelationships between concepts and statements.

Cronin, P., Ryan, F., & Coughlan, M. (2010). Concept analysis in healthcare research. International Journal of Therapy & Rehabilitation, 17(2), 62–68.

The theoretical and philosophical underpinnings of concept analysis are described in this article. In addition, methods used for concept analysis are discussed.

Ekeland, E., Heian, F., Hagen, K., Abbott, H., & Nordheim, L. (2008). Exercise to improve self-esteem in children and young people. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, (1).

This systematic review examines the influence of exercise on the self-esteem of children and young adults.

Parse, R. R. (2006). Concept inventing: Continuing clarification. Nursing Science Quarterly, 19(4), 289.

This article provides an overview of concept inventing and describes the process as a nonlinear multidimensional approach that requires simultaneous analysis and synthesis.

Penrod, J. (2007). Living with uncertainty: concept advancement. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 57(6), 658–667.

This article provides an analysis of a phenomenological study on the concept of uncertainty among family caregivers.

Optional Resources

Brown, C., Wickline, M., Ecoff, L., & Glaser, D. (2009). Nursing practice, knowledge, attitudes and perceived barriers to evidence-based practice at an academic medical center. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 65(2), 371–3 81.

Risjord, M. (2009). Rethinking concept analysis. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 65(3), 684–691.

Discussion: Strategies for Concept Development and Analysis

Post your responses to the Discussion based on the course requirements.

Your Discussion postings should be written in standard edited English and follow APA guidelines as closely as possible given the constraints of the online platform. Be sure to support your work with specific citations from this week’s Learning Resources and additional scholarly sources as appropriate. Refer to the Essential Guide to APA Style for Walden Students to ensure your in-text citations and reference list are correct. Initial postings must be 250–350 words (not including references). Strategies for Concept Development and Analysis Discussion

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION 

Strategies for Concept Development and Analysis in Nursing

Introduction

Concept development is essential to the nursing profession. Nurses play a critical role in patient care and education, but they also need to be skilled at analyzing concepts to help them better understand the health needs of their patients. In this article, we’ll explore some strategies for concept analysis that can help you develop your own personalized approach.

Concept mapping

Concept mapping is a diagram that shows how concepts are related to one another. It can help you organize and prioritize research data, identify relationships between concepts, and develop a framework for future research.

Here’s an example of concept mapping:

• The first thing to do is to write your topic sentence (or “purpose” in the case of this example). Now think about how you want people to understand what your topic sentence means by combining specific terms into one big idea. For example, if your topic sentence was “nursing care,” then it would mean something like “taking care of people.” This is called “conceptualization.” It’s important because it helps us understand why we’re doing our project or paper!

Laddering

Laddering is a technique used to develop a concept map. It is an efficient way to clarify the meaning of words and concepts by asking questions, such as “How do you want your product or service to be perceived by its users?” The process of laddering helps us to organize our thoughts about what we want our product or service to do for people in order for it to be successful.

Semantic clustering

Semantic clustering is a data mining technique that groups similar items together. It can be used to analyse concepts and generate hypotheses for further research.

When you’re looking at the concept map, it’s important to consider whether there are any clusters of related terms that should be considered as separate entities within your domain. For example:

• A nursing home may have many different types of beds – some might be called “single occupancy”, while others might be referred as “bunk beds”. These terms would not necessarily mean anything in isolation, but together they could identify a new concept for future research: “Beds with one occupant”.

Referent search

Referent search is a process in which you are searching for relevant information. This can be done by looking at the context of the problem, as well as its context within your own field or practice.

Context refers to all of the factors that influence an individual’s behavior and decision making. For example: if you were asked to develop a concept for a nurse who cared for patients with diabetes, one thing you would want to consider is how your patients might feel about being treated by someone who had type 2 diabetes herself; what about their family members? Would it matter if she had children at home? What about their friends? What if everyone in town knew he had type 2 diabetes—wouldn’t that make him less attractive as a potential colleague/friend/etc.?

Review of research literature

Review of research literature is a method for concept development. It involves reading and analyzing the work of other researchers on the same topic, which can help you find out what others have learned about it and how they’ve done it.

It’s also an important part of the scientific process because it helps you test your ideas against others’ findings so that you know whether or not your hypothesis is correct.

Concept development is essential to the nursing profession.

Concept development is essential to the nursing profession. Nurses must be able to understand and organize their knowledge in order to take action, evaluate outcomes and communicate effectively with other healthcare professionals.

Concepts are the fundamental building blocks of knowledge that help nurses make sense of problems by organizing information about them into categories or patterns (see Figure 1). Concept development helps nurses to organize this information so that they can better understand a patient’s condition or need for care.

Conclusion

In conclusion, concept development is an essential part of nursing practice. Nurses use concepts to make meaning, predict behavior, and plan interventions. Concepts also help nurses understand their patients better and develop treatments that will be effective for them.