Motivation to enter nursing: Eligible applicants to nursing schools in Israel—1968

Abstract

Any study which includes cultural origins of the respondents tempts one to wander into fields not directly in the paths laid down. In this study of a selected group of young persons who were highly interested in entering nursing (as evidenced by their being accepted to discuss the practical aspects of entering a school), was given a questionnaire asking about motivation for wanting to be a nurse, information relevant to age, origins, and similar data to determine future recruitment plans. The hypotheses that the latter years of high school were the best time to start recruitment, and that all news media were good for propaganda purposes were disproved. Findings showed that young people began thinking seriously about a nursing career before they completed elementary school, and that the recruitment material they most used was factual information about entrance requirements and the actual work of nurses. The hypotheses that parents and other authority figures play a major role in career selection, and that cultural and ethnic background influence career choice were proven, and were most tempting to use as a basis for other hypotheses based on presonceptions of cultural types. It would seem, however, that the results of this study—made independently of others referred to—indicate that recruitment should begin earlier in the schooling of the young child, and that it should be realistic and factual, but geared to the idealism of the young adolescent.