Psychological distress among first-year health science students in Taiwan.

Background: Most first-year college/university students are adolescents or young adults and therefore are at high risk of developing psychological distress symptoms. Little is known about psychological distress among first-year university students in Taiwan, especially those studying health science-related fields. Objective: To understand the prevalence of psychological distress and its five dimensions (depression and anxiety, self-harm, impulsivity, and psychiatric disturbance) and explore the relationship between student-specific variables (enrollment year, age, sex, program duration, and college) and psychological distress. Methods: A secondary analysis design was adopted. We enrolled 4,212 first-year university students throughout 2016, 2017, and 2018. Health screening data were obtained using the Mental Health Scale for Undergraduate-Screening Assessment (MHSU-SA) for first-year health science students at a private technical-vocational university in northern Taiwan. Results: Many first-year university students were at-risk for depression (4.2%), anxiety (8.2%), self-harm (5.2%), impulsivity (2.6%), psychiatric disturbance (4.4%), and overall psychological distress (4.2%). Students in a four-year program were more than twice as likely to demonstrate psychological distress symptoms compared to their two-year (night) program counterparts (odds ratio = 2.05, 95% confidence interval = 1.20-3.49, p < 0.01). Conclusion: Some first-year health science university students showed psychological distress, including anxiety, self-harm, psychiatric disturbance, depression, and impulsivity. Students in four-year programs were twice as likely to show symptoms of psychological distress than those in two-year (night) programs. Therefore, mental health screenings are recommended to facilitate early detection and timely intervention for at-risk students.

Development and Psychometric Testing of a Taiwanese Team Interactions and Team Creativity Instrument (TITC-T) for Nursing Students.

BACKGROUND: How well team members work together can be affected by team interactions and creativity. There is no single instrument for measuring both variables in healthcare education settings in Taiwan. The purpose of this study is to develop an instrument to measure team interactions and team creativity for Taiwanese nursing students. METHODS: A 34-item team interactions and team creativity self-report instrument was developed for nursing students in Taiwan (TITC-T). Items consisted of statements about how a participant perceived their team members' constructive controversy, helping behaviors, communication, and creativity. Nursing students (n = 275) were recruited from two campuses of a science and technology university to examine the psychometric properties of the TITC-T. The reliability and psychometric properties were evaluated. RESULTS: The Cronbach's alpha was 0.98. The confirmatory factor analysis resulted in a one-dimensional factor structure that fit well with the model (Comparative Fit Index = 0.995, Tucker Lewis Index = 0.908, Root Mean Square Error of Approximation = 0.098). CONCLUSIONS: The TITC-T is a valid and reliable tool for evaluating team interactions and team creativity for students enrolled in nursing programs in Taiwan.

Effectiveness of Interdisciplinary Teaching on Creativity: A Quasi-Experimental Study.

Little is known about the effectiveness of Interdisciplinary teaching (IDT) in higher education, particularly for healthcare education in Taiwan. It is vital to determine if IDT could enhance divergent creative thinking and team creativity among nursing students. A quasi-experimental study with a pretest-posttest design. Students enrolled in a capstone nursing course for the development of healthcare-related products were divided into two groups. The intervention group (n = 61) was taught creative thinking skills with IDT by faculty. The control group (n = 84) was taught by nursing faculty with traditional teaching. This study found that students who received the IDT intervention scored significantly higher on measures of creative thinking and team creativity compared with students in the control group. These findings suggest integrating IDT from nursing and design faculty into the teaching curriculum to foster students' creative thinking abilities when formulating interdisciplinary student teams to develop innovative, creative healthcare products.

Predictors of individually perceived levels of team creativity for teams of nursing students in Taiwan: A cross-sectional study.

BACKGROUND: The complexity of healthcare and concurrent advances in technology have promoted Interprofessional Education (IPE) in healthcare schools to prepare students to collaborate on interdisciplinary teams. Since 2016, healthcare curricula in Taiwan have incorporated IPE-based capstone courses to enhance creativity. To better understand the predictors of team creativity could help educators improve IPE and outcomes for nursing students and patients. PURPOSE: To determine whether nursing students' demographic characteristics, individual creativity, and perceived team interaction behaviors, team swift trust, team conflict, and team task interdependence may predict high perceived team creativity in IPE settings. METHODS: A cross-sectional study design included nursing students (N = 99) at a science and technology university in Taiwan. Data from self-report questionnaires included variables for demographic characteristics, individual creativity, and perceived team characteristics. A hierarchical multiple regression analysis revealed predictors of high perceived team creativity. RESULTS: Nursing students who perceived high team creativity also perceived higher interaction behaviors and lower process conflict than those who perceived less creativity. Spontaneous communication and team task conflict predicted high perceived team creativity. CONCLUSIONS: Nursing educators could increase team creativity in IPE by encouraging spontaneous communication and constructive task-oriented conflict management. This may benefit patient outcomes in the future.

Effect of creativity training on teaching for creativity for nursing faculty in Taiwan: A quasi-experimental study.

BACKGROUND: Creativity and innovation are considered important core competencies in Taiwan for nursing students. Teachers play a critical role in the development of student creativity. Although studies have investigated creativity training, there is no consensus on how best to evaluate the effectiveness of the training. OBJECTIVE: To evaluate whether a teaching for creativity module (TCM) can enhance teaching behaviors and self-efficacy of teaching creativity for capstone course nursing faculty. The TCM intervention was taught in two stages by experts in diverse areas of industrial design. A 2-day teaching creativity workshop was followed by reinforcement of creativity skills in the classroom with nursing and design faculties teaching side-by-side for 6 h of the 18-week capstone course. DESIGN: This quasi-experimental study employed a pretest-posttest design to compare an intervention and control group. PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING: Capstone course nursing faculties were recruited from five science and technology universities in Taiwan. RESULTS: Forty-two capstone faculty members participated; 21 completed the TCM intervention and 21 were in the control group. Analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) demonstrated the TCM intervention group had significantly better post-test mean scores for creative teaching behaviors and self-efficacy of teaching creativity than the control group. Our findings suggest participation in a creativity workshop and reinforcement of teaching skills with classroom interdisciplinary teacher training can augment teaching for creativity of nursing faculty. CONCLUSION: The findings of this study indicate that an intervention program in creativity can increase teaching behaviors as well as perceptions of self-efficacy regarding teaching for creativity, which could foster student creativity. These findings have important implications for educational settings, as they suggest that the workshop and reinforcement of learning with hands-on guidance in creativity with interdisciplinary teaching should be integrated into the curriculum, which could facilitate student creativity by increasing teaching behaviors and improving self-confidence regarding teaching creativity.

Predictors of self-perceived levels of creative teaching behaviors among nursing school faculty in Taiwan: A preliminary study.

BACKGROUND: Many nursing programs include a capstone project as part of the nursing curriculum. In Taiwan, these courses involve development of healthcare products. A student's success can depend on faculty's ability to employ creative teaching behaviors. PURPOSE: To examine the relationship between demographic and teaching characteristics, personality traits, and self-perceived levels of creative teaching behaviors for capstone nursing faculty. METHODS: This study used a cross-sectional, descriptive, correlational study design. Faculty (N = 53) were recruited from healthcare schools in Taiwan. Data from self-report questionnaires included variables for demographic and teaching characteristics, perceived levels of creative personality traits (imagination, curiosity, adventure, challenge) and creative teaching behaviors (autonomous learning, creative thinking, characteristics/motivations, environment/opportunity). Hierarchical multiple regression identified predictors of creative teaching behaviors. RESULTS: Mean total scores for creative teaching behaviors were high for nursing faculty; characteristics/motivations were the lowest subscale score. The creative personality trait of curiosity significantly and positively influenced the perception of high levels creative teaching behaviors. CONCLUSIONS: High scores for curiosity significantly predicted high scores for creative teaching behaviors for nursing faculty. These findings suggest faculty who perceive themselves as having low levels of creative teaching behaviors might benefit from training to increase levels of curiosity.

Conflict and interactions on interdisciplinary nursing student teams: The moderating effects of spontaneous communication.

BACKGROUND: Recently, empirical researchers have observed direct associations between conflict and interaction behaviors within organizational teams. However, research concerning indirect links between conflict and interaction behaviors on interdisciplinary teams in nursing school is scant, particularly in Taiwan. OBJECTIVES: The aim of this study was to explore the relationships among various types of conflict and interaction behaviors on interdisciplinary nursing education teams. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS: This study utilized a cross-sectional, quantitative, descriptive design. The authors collected survey data from 99 nursing students who participated in 18-week capstone courses of small interdisciplinary groups collaborating to design healthcare products in Taiwan during 2018 and 2019. METHODS: Questionnaires assessed the nursing students' perceptions about their teams' conflicts (of task, process, and relationship), and interaction behaviors (constructive controversy, helping behaviors, and spontaneous communication). The authors used descriptive statistics to compare demographics, conflict scores, and interaction behavior scores for collocated and distributed interdisciplinary teams. A Pearson's analysis identified correlations among the variables and their components, and the SPSS PROCESS macro showed moderating effects of spontaneous communication on the relationship between distributed team and conflict subscales. RESULTS: After confirming the distributed team experienced significantly more conflict than the collocated team, we found significant negative correlations between constructive controversy and both process conflict and relationship conflict on the distributed team. Another interaction behavior, spontaneous communication, had a moderating effect on the relationships between the distributed team and both task conflict and relationship conflict. CONCLUSION: In interdisciplinary educational settings for nursing students, spontaneous communication may moderate the types of conflict that distributed teams are more likely than collocated teams to experience. Constructive controversy may be especially effective at mitigating conflict on distributed teams. Nursing educators may refer to these insights to improve outcomes for educational interdisciplinary healthcare teams.