The Critical Research Evaluation Tool (CRET): A Teaching and Learning Tool to Evaluate Research for Cultural Competence.

The aim of this study was to present the Critical Research Evaluation Tool (CRET) which teaches evaluation of the researchers' worldview, applicability to multicultural populations, and ethics surrounding potential harms to communities. To provide best cultural care nurses' need to understand how historical/social/political experiences impact health and also influence research. The Student using the CRET reported receiving a strong foundation in research fundamentals, gaining a better understanding of critical frameworks in research, and learning more about themselves and reflecting on their own privileges and biases. The CRET provides nursing students and nursing faculty with a tool for examining diversity and ultimately decreasing health disparity.

Black Feminism: An Integrated Review of Literature.

This study presents a systematic literature review exploring the uses and potential benefits of Black Feminism in nursing research. Black Feminism may benefit knowledge development for nursing in a variety of ways, such as illuminating the multifaceted factors of Black women's identities in helping scholars move away from generalization of experiences, to improve understanding of health disparities, and making such changes by broadening the social consciousness of the nurse researchers, who are predominantly White. Discrimination in health disparities may be deconstructed if the focus is placed on asking different research questions and offering different interventions with the social structures that contributes to such actions. When Black Feminism guides the research method (including research questions and analysis), the accuracy of representing the experiences of Black women is increased. In this research, Black Feminism highlights experience, coping mechanisms, spiritual values, a tradition of strength, and a holistic view of identity.

The lived experience of socialization among African American nursing students in a predominantly White university.

PURPOSE: This study explored the phenomenon of socialization among African American nursing students in predominantly White universities. Recruitment and retention of African American nursing students is in lower percentages compared with other groups. Many nursing schools reflect a culture of the White middle class, which may present a barrier to minority students by requiring students to socialize to a culture different from their own. Overcoming such barriers cannot begin until the experience of socialization is understood. DESIGN: A sample consisting of eight co-researchers was used who all attended nursing school at a predominantly White university. Interviews were analyzed using Colaizzi's phenomenological method. RESULTS: The following six themes emerged: Theme 1--The Strength to Pursue More, Theme 2--Encounters With Discrimination, Theme 3--Pressure to Succeed, Theme 4--Isolation and Sticking Together, Theme 5--To Fit In and Talk White, and Theme 6--To Learn With New Friends and Old Ones. CONCLUSIONS: This study found a strongly consistent process of socialization to the dominant norm, and raised questions about the effects of this process on African American nursing students and its impact on improving patient care.

Interconnectedness in nursing: a concept analysis.

AIM: Interconnectedness will be clarified and defined by providing a description and context and take an important step toward increasing use in nursing literature and research. BACKGROUND: The literature is limited by focusing on relationships between people, but connection can be physical as with physics or spiritual by reflecting a higher power or purpose. Thorough examination will increase understanding of interconnectedness in nursing. METHODS: Chinn and Kramer's method for creating conceptual meaning includes definitions, visual images, popular/classical literature, music, poetry, and professional research across many disciplines. FINDINGS: Interconnectedness reflects that people and the universe are connected in a powerful way. Its essential meaning reflects that regardless of the worldly barriers of politics, religion, or culture, people can share in a universal reciprocity of love and responsibility. CONCLUSION: Nursing maintains the values of compassion, responsibility, holism, and to greater meaning in experiences, and interconnectedness will likely have increased significance in nursing.