Trustworthiness In Nursing

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Trustworthiness. Qualitative studies use trustworthiness as a way to measure the reliability and validity of data (Houser, 2015, p. 393). Trustworthiness has four components: credibility, dependability, confirmability, and transferability (Houser, 2015, p. 393). First, credibility is defined as the participant’s reality being accurately represented (Houser, 2015, p. 393). Credibility was represented when the researcher encouraged the participants to share their experiences openly. Once the researcher gathered the new nurses’ experiences and the information was transcribed, the new nurses’ were encouraged to verify the information for accuracy and were allowed to add any additional information to support the experiences if they felt it wasn’t …show more content…

The researchers analyzed the data as it was collected during the fieldwork process (Bjerknes & Bjork, 2012, p. 3). First, the researchers read the transcripts multiple times (Bjerknes & Bjork, 2012, p. 3). From the transcripts, the researchers identified concepts (Bjerknes & Bjork, 2012, p. 3). With a couple of participants, the researchers provided detailed descriptions by using the principle of analyzing abundant data (Bjerknes & Bjork, 2012, p. 3). After a year of fieldwork, the researchers performed the main analysis of the data (Bjerknes & Bjork, 2012, p. 3). This analysis began with open questions (Bjerknes & Bjork, 2012, p. 3). Asking the open-ended questions, such as, “What do new graduates do?” and “What are they talking about?” led to more specific questions (Bjerknes & Bjork, 2012, p. 3). As the researchers analyzed the data with specific questions, themes such as “nurse’s responsibility” and “being busy” became apparent and recurrent (Bjerknes & Bjork, 2012, p. 3). The last step of data analysis the researchers performed was comparing and contrasting one nurse’s sources of data to the sample of data collected (Bjerknes & Bjork, 2015, p. 3). The researchers looked for similarities and differences in the way the nurses experienced nursing as a whole and in different situations (Bjerknes & Bjork, 2012, p. 3). This type of data analysis tells the reader that the researchers were trying to find common themes among the data …show more content…

The researchers clearly acknowledged two strengths of the study. The first strength identified was the main researcher’s prior experiences as a nurse and a nurse educator (Bjerknes & Bjork, 2012, p. 6). This prior experience influenced the topic of new nurses to be chosen and led to an experienced nurse’s perspective on the observations of new nurses (Bjerknes & Bjork, 2012, p. 6). The second strength identified by the researchers was the small sample size (Bjerknes & Bjork, 2012, p. 6). This allowed the researchers to closely observe the participants, have more time for interviews, repeat interviews, and ongoing journal reflections from the new nurses (Bjerknes & Bjork, 2012, p. 6). A strength of ethnographic research designs is being able to draw conclusions from “real life” situations (Houser, 2015, p. 404). This study allowed insight into the culture of being a nurse and the ability to draw conclusions from their experiences first hand (Bjerknes & Bjork, 2012, pp. 5-6). One last strength that was identified, but not clearly stated was that the researcher wasn’t an employee at the hospital and allowed the new nurses to be able be honest about their perceptions (Bjerknes & Bjork, 2012, p.

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