PERCEPTIONS OF ACTUAL AND PREFERRED HOSPITAL CLINICAL LEARNING ENVIRONMENT OF STUDENT NURSES IN ENUGU STATE

This study investigated the actual and preferred hospital clinical learning environment (CLE) of student nurses in Enugu state. This research specifically assessed the student nurses view of their actual and preferred hospital CLE, determine if differences exist in student nurses view of their actual and preferred hospital CLE, establish the association between the actual and preferred hospital CLE and students’ age, gender, location and year of study and identify factors that influence student nurses opinion of their hospital CLE. A cross sectional descriptive survey design was adopted for the study which permits the observation, description and documentations of aspects of a situation as it naturally occurred. The sample size of 454 nursing students was purposively chosen for the study. Data were collected using two validated instrument thus; researcher developed questionnaire and adapted 42 item standardized clinical learning environment inventory (CLEI) (Actual and Preferred) questionnaires. Data analysis was done using frequency counts, simple percentages, means and standard deviation for research objectives, while t-test with cut off point of 2.50 MANOVA and ANOVA were employed in testing the eight null hypotheses at .05 level of significance. The findings revealed that there is significant difference in the student nurses view of their actual and preferred hospital CLE (p