Introduction to Nursing Theories
Nursing 210
Spring 2004
Curlissa Mapp RN, BSN
Georgia Baptist College of Nursing of
Mercer University
“ Practicing nurses who despise theory
are condemned to performing a series of
tasks - either at the command of a
physician or in response to routines and
policies.”
Leah Curtin, RN, MS, FAAN (1989)
Former Editor, Nursing Management
• WHY STUDY
NURSING THEORY?
• WHAT DOES THE
PRACTICING NURSE
WANT FROM
NURSING THEORY?
Nursing must examine:
What is the nature of
knowledge needed for the
practice of nursing?
What it means to practice
nursing?
• The study and use of
nursing theory in
nursing practice must
have roots in the
everyday practice of
nurses
(Gordon, Parker, Jester, 2001)
Reasons for Studying Nursing Theory
• Everyday practice enriches
theory
• Practice and theory guided by
values and beliefs
• Reframe thinking about
nursing
• Theory guides use of ideas
and techniques
• Close gap between theory and
research
• Envision potentialities
(Gordon, Parker, Jester, 2001)
Nursing Theory and the Practicing Nurse
• Theory assists the practicing
nurse to:
• Organize patient data
• Understand patient data
• Analyze patient data
• Make decisions about nursing
interventions
• Plan patient care
• Predict outcomes of care
• Evaluate patient outcomes
(Alligood, 2001)
STURUCTURAL HIERARCHY OF NURSING
KNOWLEDGE: COMPONENTS & LEVEL OF
ABSTRACTIONS
Metaparadigm
Most Abstract
Philosophies
Conceptual Models
Theories
Empirical Indicators
Most Concrete
METAPARADIGM
- Global concepts that
identify the phenomena of
interest
- Global propositions that
describe the concepts
- Global propositions that
state the relations between
the concepts
(Fawcett, 2000)
FUNCTION OF THE
METAPARADIGM
• Summarize the
intellectual and social
missions of a discipline
and place a boundary on
the subject matter of that
discipline
METAPARADIGM
• Phenomena of interest to
nursing is represented by
Four Central Concepts
1. Person
2. Environment
3. Health
4. Nursing
PHILOSOPHIES
• A statement
encompassing claims
about a phenomena of
central interest to a
discipline, claims about
how a phenomena comes
to be known and claims
about what the members
of a discipline value
FUNCTION OF PHILOSOPHIES
• To Communicate:
- What people assume to be true
in relation to the phenomena
of interest to a discipline.
(Christensen & Kenney, 1990)
- What people believe regarding
the development of knowledge
about those phenomena
PHILOSOPHIES
• Florence Nightingale’s
work is an example of a
philosophy
• Example of philosophical
statement
“ the individual … behaves
purposefully, not in a
sequence of cause and
effect.”
(Roy, 1988, p. 32)
CONCEPTS
• Word or phrase that
summarizes the essential
characteristics or
properties of a
phenomenon
• Abstract idea (i.e. Hope,
love, desire, pain, body
temperature)
• Derived from impressions
the human mind receives
about phenomena through
sensing the environment
(McEwen & Willis, 2002)
CONCEPTS
• Are equivalent of bricks
in a wall and lend
structure to science
(Hardy, 1973, Wuest,
1994)
• Are defined for each
specific use the writer or
researcher makes of the
term (Hardy, 1973)
CONCEPTS
• When operationalized
become variables used in
hypotheses to be tested in
research.
• Explicate subject matter
of theories of a discipline
CONCEPTUAL MODELS
• A set of abstract and
general concepts and
propositions that integrate
those concepts into a
meaningful configuration.
(Lippitt, 1973; Nye &
Berardo, 1981)
FUNCTION OF CONCEPTUAL
MODELS
• Frameworks or paradigms
that provide “a broad
frame of reference for
systematic approaches to
the phenomena with
which the discipline is
concerned. (Tomey &
Alligood, 2002)
EXAMPLE CONCEPTUAL MODELS
- King’s General
Systems Framework
- Roy’s Adaptation
Model
CONCEPTUAL MODELS
• Word structures that
provide a specific view on
nursing through the
interrelationship of
concepts in the structure.
• VERBAL – worded
statements, a form closely
related to knowledge
development
• SCHEMATIC – diagrams,
drawings, graphs or
pictures that facilitate
understanding
THEORIES
• A group of related
concepts that propose
action that guides practice
• Consist of one or more
relatively specific and
concrete concepts and
propositions that purport
to account for or organize
some phenomenon
(Barnum, 1998)
FUNCTION OF THEORIES
Primary Purpose:
To Generate
Knowledge
Theories vary in their level of abstraction
and scope
• GRAND THEORY
- More abstract and broad in
scope
• MIDDLE-RANGE
THEORY
- More concrete and
narrower in scope
Nursing Theory
• Describes or Explains
Nursing
• Enable nurses to know
WHY they are doing
WHAT they are doing
EMPIRICAL INDICATORS
• A very concrete and specific
real world proxy for a middlerange theory concept;
• An actual instrument,
experimental condition or
clinical procedure that is used
to observe or measure a
middle-range theory concept
(Fawcett, 2002)
FUNCTION OF EMPIRICAL
INDICATORS
• Provide the means by which
middle-range theories are
generated or tested
• Indicators that are
experimental conditions or
clinical procedures tell the
researcher or clinician exactly
what to do ( protocols or
scripts that direct actions in a
precise manner)
(Fawcett, 2002)
SUMMARY