Nurses in emotional competence: exploratory study on population of continued care national network
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abstract
The relevance of this study - the first empirical research (to our knowledge) in Continued
Care National Network (RCNN) context - emerge to understand the role of emotions in
workplace behaviour (Côté, 2005; Austin, Dore & Donovan, 2008; Liu et al. 2008; Barsade,
Ramarajan, Burack, 2008), but here, with terminally ill people and great physical and psychological
weakness. Recent scientific literature is exposing a significatly negative correlations
between Emotional Intelligence (EI) and emotional exhaution; and significantly positive correlations
between EI and occupational identity (Geng; Li; Zhou, 2011), and the development
of emotional competence (EC) skills in workplace context (Veiga-Branco, 2007, 2010, 2011).
Authors agree with the relationship between emotional responses, therapeutic relationship
and perception of job satisfaction (Li, 2004; Hart & Walton, 2010; Karim & Weiz, 2010).
Keywords: emotional inteligence, emotional competence profile, nurses
Aim: to know, the capacities levels in the Emotional Competence (EC) profile in a
nurses sample of RNCC, and study the five capacities as predictive variables, in the their
Emotional Competence’s (EC) profile.
Method:A cross-sectional survey was carried out in a probabilistic sample including
154 nurses in RNCC, about 22 % male and 78% female, and aged between 26 and 30 years
old. The instrument applied was “Escala Veiga de Competência Emocional” (EVCE), developed
by Veiga-Branco (2009), with 84 itens, in temporal Lickert scale, from Never (1)
to Always (7). Data was analyzed using descriptive statistics. Factor analysis was used
to identify capacities. Additionally, a multiple regression analysis was conducted to determine
the relationship between capacities and EC and to establish the capacities that
were the strongest predictors of EC.
Conclusions/Results :
1. Five competencies were identified in this study. The ranking of the correlations
was as follows: Empathy (r=0.783; p<0.01), Emotions Management in Group (r=0.724;
p<0.01), Emotions Management (r=0.760; p<0.01), Self-motivation (r=0.693;p<0.01),
and Self-conscience (r=0.678; p<0.01). The results were according the American Society
of Registered Nurses (2007) that emphasizes the need of emotional skills in nursing
education.
2. The Cronbach Alpha for Internal Consistency obtained for each of the capacities was as follows: Empathy (0.854), Emotions Management in Group (0.833), Emotions
Management (0.740), Self-motivation (0.705), and Self-conscience (0.622).
3. The estimated regression model includes Empaty, Emotion Management, Self-
Motivation, Emotions Management in Group, Self-conscience, that represents 97,4% of
the variance in EC. This result, not according the theoretical model (Caruso & Salovey,2004), presents how much important is empathy in work settings.
