Description
Background
Gender Gap: Women represent 88.5% of registered nurses in the U.S. (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2021)
- Nurses have been devalued and degraded socially, professionally, and economically, especially with COVID-19 (National Nurses United, 2020).
- Reflects gender roles and societal perceptions of women as “lesser” and thus nursing is avoided by men.
Role/Goal Congruence Theory
- According to role congruence theory, social roles direct individuals on their life path, most notably in their career choices (Diekman & Eagly, 2008).
- Goal congruence theory suggests men and women tend to chase careers that align with agentic or communal goals, respectively (Diekman et al., 2010).
Misconceptions of Nursing
- People generally perceive nursing as feminine and low in status.
- But the responsibilities of a nurse are as equally rooted in management and medical competence as they are in interpersonal care (Oldland et al., 2020).
- If people perceive nursing as more agentic based on the legitimate role nurses play on a day-to-day basis, given role and goal congruency theories, perhaps male students would be more interested in pursuing the career.
Stigma or Nursing itself ?
- Objective: Will removing the potentially biasing label of “nurse” and reframing nursing in agentic language increase men’s interest in the nursing profession?
Included in
The Gendered Profession: Resuscitating the Value of the Male Nurse in the Pre-Health Undergraduate Eye
Background
Gender Gap: Women represent 88.5% of registered nurses in the U.S. (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2021)
- Nurses have been devalued and degraded socially, professionally, and economically, especially with COVID-19 (National Nurses United, 2020).
- Reflects gender roles and societal perceptions of women as “lesser” and thus nursing is avoided by men.
Role/Goal Congruence Theory
- According to role congruence theory, social roles direct individuals on their life path, most notably in their career choices (Diekman & Eagly, 2008).
- Goal congruence theory suggests men and women tend to chase careers that align with agentic or communal goals, respectively (Diekman et al., 2010).
Misconceptions of Nursing
- People generally perceive nursing as feminine and low in status.
- But the responsibilities of a nurse are as equally rooted in management and medical competence as they are in interpersonal care (Oldland et al., 2020).
- If people perceive nursing as more agentic based on the legitimate role nurses play on a day-to-day basis, given role and goal congruency theories, perhaps male students would be more interested in pursuing the career.
Stigma or Nursing itself ?
- Objective: Will removing the potentially biasing label of “nurse” and reframing nursing in agentic language increase men’s interest in the nursing profession?