This article reports a survey of nurses in different cultural settings to reveal their perceptions of ethical role responsibilities relevant to nursing practice. Drawing on the Confucian theory of ethics, the first section attempts to understand nursing ethics in the context of multiple role relationships. The second section reports the administration of the Role Responsibilities Questionnaire (RRQ) to a sample of nurses in China (n = 413), the USA (n = 163), and Japan (n = 667). Multidimensional preference analysis revealed (...) the patterns of rankings given by the nurses to the statements they considered as important ethical responsibilities. The Chinese nurses were more virtue based in their perception of ethical responsibilities, the American nurses were more principle based, and the Japanese nurses were more care based. The findings indicate that the RRQ is a sensitive instrument for outlining the embedded sociocultural factors that influence nurses’ perceptions of ethical responsibilities in the realities of nursing practice. This study could be important in the fostering of partnerships in international nursing ethics. (shrink)

This article aims to deepen the understanding of courage through a theoretical analysis of classical philosophers’ work and a review of published and unpublished empirical research on courage in nursing. The authors sought answers to questions regarding how courage is understood from a philosophical viewpoint and how it is expressed in nursing actions. Four aspects were identified as relevant to a deeper understanding of courage in nursing practice: courage as an ontological concept, a moral virtue, a property of an ethical (...) act, and a creative capacity. The literature review shed light on the complexity of the concept of courage and revealed some lack of clarity in its use. Consequently, if courage is to be used consciously to influence nurses’ ethical actions it seems important to recognize its specific features. The results suggest it is imperative to foster courage among nurses and student nurses to prepare them for ethical, creative action and further the development of professional nursing practices. (shrink)

In a recent, currently unpublished, research project that sought to examine the meaning and enactment of ethical nursing practice across a variety of clinical settings, the significance of moral identity was highlighted. This article describes the findings and illuminates how the moral identities of the nurse participants arose and evolved as they navigated their way through the contextual and systemic forces that shaped the moral situations of their practice. The study revealed the socially-mediated process of identity development and the narrative, (...) dialogical, relational and contextual nature of nurses’ moral identities. (shrink)