Significance and Purposes of
Nursing Research
Reference: Nursing Research: Generating and Assessing Evidence for
Nursing Practice by Polit and Beck
Topic Outcomes
• On completing this topic, you will be able to:
• Describe why research is important in the nursing profession and discuss
the need for evidence-based practice
• Describe historic trends and future directions in nursing research
• Describe alternative sources of evidence for nursing practice
• Describe major characteristics of the positivist and naturalistic paradigm,
and discuss similarities and differences between the traditional scientific
method (quantitative research) and naturalistic methods (qualitative
research)
• Identify several purposes of qualitative and quantitative research
• Define new terms in the chapter
What Is Nursing Research?
• Research is systematic inquiry that uses disciplined methods to
answer questions and solve problems.
• The ultimate goal of research is to develop, refine, and expand a body
of knowledge.
• Nursing research is systematic inquiry designed to develop
trustworthy evidence about issues of importance to the nursing
profession, including nursing practice, education, administration, and
informatics
• Clinical nursing research, that is, research designed to guide nursing
practice and to improve the health and quality of life of nurses’
clients.
The Importance of Research to Evidence-
Based Nursing Practice
• Evidence-based practice (EBP).
• It is broadly defined as the use of the best clinical evidence in making
patient care decisions, and such evidence typically comes from
research conducted by nurses and other health care professionals.
Example of evidence-based practice:
• “Kangaroo care,” the holding of diaper-clad preterm infants skin-to-
skin, chest-to-chest by parents, is now widely practiced in neonatal
intensive care units (NICUs) in the United States and elsewhere, but
this is a new trend. As recently as the early 1990s, only a minority of
NICUs offered kangaroo care options. The adoption of this practice
reflects the mounting evidence that early skin-to-skin contact has
clinical benefits without any apparent negative side effects (Dodd,
2005; Galligan, 2006). Some of the accumulated evidence was
developed in rigorous studies by nurse researchers in the United
States, Australia, Canada, Taiwan, Korea, and other countries (e.g.,
Chwo et al., 2002; Ludington-Hoe et al.,2004, 2006; Moore &
Anderson, 2007).
Roles of Nurses in Research
• 1. consumers of nursing research
• 2. producers of nursing research
HISTORIC LANDMARKS IN NURSING RESEARCH
• 1859 Nightingale’s Notes on Nursing is published
• 1900 American Nursing Journal begins publication
• 1923 Columbia University establishes first doctoral program for nurses Goldmark
Report with recommendations for nursing education published
• 1930s American Journal of Nursing publishes clinical cases studies
• 1936 Sigma Theta Tau awards first nursing research grant in the United States
• 1948 Brown publishes report on inadequacies of nursing education
• 1952 The journal Nursing Research begins publication
• 1955 Inception of the American Nurses’ Foundation to sponsor nursing research
• 1957 Establishment of nursing research center at Walter Reed Army Institute of
Research
• 1963 International Journal of Nursing Studies begins publication
• 1965 American Nurses’ Association (ANA) begins sponsoring nursing research conferences
• 1969 Canadian Journal of Nursing Research begins publication
• 1971 ANA establishes a Commission on Research
• 1972 ANA establishes its Council of Nurse Researchers
• 1976 Stetler and Marram publish guidelines on assessing research for use in practice
• 1978 The journals Research in Nursing & Health and Advances in Nursing Science begin publication
• 1979 Western Journal of Nursing Research begins publication
• 1982 The Conduct and Utilization of Research in Nursing (CURN) project publishes report
• 1983 Annual Review of Nursing Research begins publication
• 1985 ANA Cabinet on Nursing Research establishes research priorities
• 1986 National Center for Nursing Research (NCNR) established within U.S. National Institutes of Health
• 1988 The journal Applied Nursing Research begins publication
• 1989 U.S. Agency for Health Care Policy and Research (AHCPR) is established (renamed
Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality or AHRQ in 1999)
• 1993 NCNR becomes a full institute, the National Institute of Nursing Research (NINR)
The Cochrane Collaboration is established
• 1994 The journal Qualitative Health Research begins publication
• 1995 The Joanna Briggs Institute, an international EBP collaborative, is established in
Australia
• 1997 Canadian Health Services Research Foundation is established with federal funding
• 2000 NINR’s annual funding exceeds $100 million
• The Canadian Institute of Health Research is launched
• 2004 The journal Worldviews on Evidence-Based Nursing begins publication
• 2005 Sigma Theta Tau International publishes research priorities
Directions for Nursing Research in the New
Millennium
• Heightened focus on EBP. Concerted efforts to use research findings
in practice are sure to continue, and nurses at all levels will be
encouraged to engage in evidence-based patient care. In turn,
improvements will be needed both in the quality of nursing studies
and in nurses’ skills in locating, understanding, critiquing, and using
relevant study results. Relatedly, there is an emerging interest in
translational research—research on how findings from studies can
best be translated into nursing practice
• Greater emphasis on systematic reviews. Systematic reviews are a
cornerstone of EBP, and undoubtedly will increase in importance in all
health disciplines. Systematic reviews amass and integrate
comprehensive research information on a topic to draw conclusions
about the state of evidence.
• Expanded local research in health care settings. There will almost
certainly be an increase of small, localized research designed to solve
immediate problems. In the United States, this trend will be
reinforced as more hospitals apply for (and are recertified for)
Magnet status. Mechanisms need to be developed to ensure that
evidence from these small projects becomes available to others facing
similar problems.
• Strengthening of multidisciplinary collaboration. Interdisciplinary
collaboration of nurses with researchers in related fields (as well as
intradisciplinary collaboration among nurse researchers) is likely to
continue to expand in the 21st century as researchers address
fundamental problems at the biobehavioral and psychobiologic
interface.
• Expanded dissemination of research findings. The Internet and other
electronic communications have a big impact on the dissemination of
research information, which in turn helps to promote EBP. Through
such technologic advances as electronic location and retrieval of
research articles; on-line publishing (e.g., the Online Journal of
Knowledge Synthesis for Nursing); on-line resources such as
Lippincott’s NursingCenter.com; e-mail; and electronic mailing lists,
information about innovations can be communicated more widely
and more quickly than ever before.
• Increasing the visibility of nursing research. Efforts to increase the
visibility of nursing research will likely expand. Most people are
unaware that nurses are scholars and researchers. Nurse researchers
internationally must market themselves and their research to
professional organizations, consumer organizations, governments,
and the corporate world to increase support for their research.
• Increased focus on cultural issues and health disparities. The issue of
health disparities has emerged as a central concern in nursing and
other health disciplines, and this in turn has raised consciousness
about the ecologic validity and cultural sensitivity of health
interventions. Ecologic validity refers to the extent to which study
designs and findings have relevance and meaning in a variety of real-
world contexts. There is growing awareness that research must be
sensitive to the health beliefs, behaviors, epidemiology, and values of
culturally and linguistically diverse populations.
• global nursing priorities identified the following:
• (1) health promotion and disease prevention;
• (2) promotion of health of vulnerable and marginalized communities;
• (3) patient safety;
• (4) development of evidence-based practice and translational research;
• (5) promotion of the health and well-being of older people;
• (6) patient-centered care and care coordination;
• (7) palliative and end-of-life care;
• (8) care implications of genetic testing and therapeutics;
• (9) capacity development of nurse researchers; and
• (9) nurses’ working environments (Sigma Theta Tau International, 2005).
SOURCES OF EVIDENCE FOR NURSING
PRACTICE
• Tradition and Authority
• Clinical Experience, Trial and Error, and Intuition
• Logical Reasoning (Inductive and Deductive)
• Assembled Information (Benchmarking, Quality improvement and
risk data,)
• Disciplined Research
PARADIGMS FOR NURSING RESEARCH
• A paradigm is a world view, a general perspective on the complexities
of the real world.
PURPOSES OF NURSING RESEARCH
• 1. Basic research is undertaken to extend the base of knowledge in a
discipline.
• 2. Applied research focuses on finding solutions to existing problems.
