Nursing education curriculum: Relationship among imagination, verbal, visual and critical thinking

49^th Annual Nursing Research and Evidence Based Practice Conference

August 20-21, 2018 Tokyo, Japan

Dale M Hilty

Mount Carmel College of Nursing, USA

Posters & Accepted Abstracts: Adv Practice Nurs

Abstract :

American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN; 2008) emphasizes the role and function of critical thinking for professional nursing practice in nine essential areas (e.g., high quality and safe patient care). One of the unique challenges of critical thinking is discovering a solution to open-ended problems because such dilemmas involve meaning, truth and value simultaneously. Meaning, truth and value can vary from healthcare providers and patient perspectives. Until there is an agreement (meaning, truth, value), a framework for problem resolution can remain elusive. According to reed (2010), awareness of verbal thinking versus visual thinking evolves in our reflections and communications with others. Our emphasis on verbal thoughts and language may cause us to minimize the value of visual thinking. A psychology of imagination course was created as an elective option. The sources for the verbal thinking information for the course were selected from Peterson and Seligman (2004). The design of the psychological of imagination course integrated verbal and visual thinking applied to the 12 constructs: Nothing, self-regulation, enthusiasm, science, flow and flourishing, love and forgiveness, peace and conflict, happiness and contentment, creativity, integrity, beauty and excellence and culture and gender. 57 BSN undergraduate students provided pre- and post-test self-report ratings. Students rated their levels of verbal and visual thinking as per construct prior to and after the active learning classroom experience. The dependent t-test analysis found students self-report ratings reflected an increased capacity for integrating verbal and visual thinking. Statistical significance was found for the 12 constructs (p=0.001).

Biography :

Dale M Hilty is an Associate Professor at the Mt. Carmel College of Nursing. He has received his PhD in Counseling Psychology from the Department of Psychology, The Ohio State University. He has published studies in the areas of psychology, sociology and religion. Between April 2017 and April 2018, his 10 research teams published 55 posters at local, state, regional, national and international nursing conferences.

E-mail: dhilty@mccn.edu