Professional socialisation of nursing students in a collectivist culture: a qualitative study

BACKGROUND: Beyond the formal curriculum of skill attainment, nursing students are able to undergo the professional socialisation process in clinical contexts and establish their identity as healthcare providers. However, the cultural context that affects the socialisation process in clinical placements is less discussed. We aimed to explore nursing students’ learning and professional socialisation during clinical placements by considering the socio-cultural contexts in South Korea. METHODS: A grounded theory approach was used for this research. Four rounds of in-depth and intensive interviews were carried out, with the recruitment of 16 nursing students, four nurses and two university lecturers in South Korea (29 interviews in total). A constructivist grounded theory framework was adopted to analyse the interview data. NVivo 11 was used to manage the interview data for analysis. RESULTS: The researchers identified the process of learning and professional socialisation under three core themes: 1) Struggling at the bottom of the hierarchy, 2) Acceptance and conformity, and 3) The need for ‘nunchi’ (in Korean, it means to study the atmosphere and discover the embedded intention of others’ behaviour). The results offered insights into the challenges encountered by nursing students on clinical placements and how students attempt to adapt and conform to the difficulties encountered in clinical education to maximise their learning and for their professional socialisation. The significance of the hidden curriculum was discussed. CONCLUSIONS: While experiential learning is a great opportunity for students to build on their coping skills and professional socialisation, a lack of support can result in failure to manage the hidden curriculum and theoretical and practical skills. Nursing educators therefore need to orientate students to the professional culture prior to beginning clinical placements. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1186/s12909-019-1690-z) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.