IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/wly/jocnur/v19y2010i9-10p1298-1306.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

In the know: cognitive and social factors in mental health nursing assessment

Author

Listed:
  • Padraig MacNeela
  • Anne Scott
  • Pearl Treacy
  • Abbey Hyde

Abstract

Aims and objectives. To develop an integrated cognitive and social understanding of assessment in mental health nursing. Background. Assessment is a vital component of nursing care for mental health service users, largely driven by a tacit, experiential model of assessment; this approach is at variance with an evidence‐based approach to assessment. Design. A qualitative design was employed in the study, with a thematic analysis carried out on transcripts of focus groups with mental health nurses. Method. Ten focus groups were carried out, guided by questions on nurses’ contribution to care and the problems patients present with. Fifty‐nine registered mental health nurses were sampled from eight acute and community mental health services across urban and rural regions in Ireland. Results. References to assessment were identified (how nurses acquired information, how it was made sense of and used in the system of care). Assessment talk was characterised by reliance on a experientially based clinical schema and recognition of the task environment’s shaping influence. Nurses’ clinical knowledge was a pragmatic tool that permitted nurses to assess risk, promote patient engagement and work with doctors. Conclusions. Nurses strived to ‘know the patient’, while having to ‘work the system’, with implications for patient care and decision‐making quality. Reliance on experiential knowledge is a professional trait, but one that renders nursing assessment ‘invisible’ in significant ways. Relevance to clinical practice. Cognitive and social aspects of nursing decision‐making have been considered apart from one another, whereas cognitions about mental health conditions are, in fact, applied in a pragmatic, task‐oriented organisational system. Nurses believed that spending time with the service user led to a privileged position of knowledge in comparison with doctors (‘knowing the person’), but this knowledge is frequently applied to the task of ‘knowing the patient’, assessing the person as a source of risk and danger.

Suggested Citation

  • Padraig MacNeela & Anne Scott & Pearl Treacy & Abbey Hyde, 2010. "In the know: cognitive and social factors in mental health nursing assessment," Journal of Clinical Nursing, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 19(9‐10), pages 1298-1306, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:wly:jocnur:v:19:y:2010:i:9-10:p:1298-1306
    DOI: 10.1111/j.1365-2702.2009.03127.x
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2702.2009.03127.x
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/j.1365-2702.2009.03127.x?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Shanteau, James & Weiss, David J. & Thomas, Rickey P. & Pounds, Julia C., 2002. "Performance-based assessment of expertise: How to decide if someone is an expert or not," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 136(2), pages 253-263, January.
    2. Hamilton, Bridget Elizabeth & Manias, Elizabeth, 2007. "Rethinking nurses' observations: Psychiatric nursing skills and invisibility in an acute inpatient setting," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 65(2), pages 331-343, July.
    3. Quirk, Alan & Lelliott, Paul & Seale, Clive, 2004. "Service users' strategies for managing risk in the volatile environment of an acute psychiatric ward," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 59(12), pages 2573-2583, December.
    4. Gary Klein, 1999. "Sources of Power: How People Make Decisions," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262611465, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Tim Rakow & Charles Vincent & Kate Bull & Nigel Harvey, 2005. "Assessing the Likelihood of an Important Clinical Outcome: New Insights from a Comparison of Clinical and Actuarial Judgment," Medical Decision Making, , vol. 25(3), pages 262-282, May.
    2. Betsch, Tilmann & Haberstroh, Susanne & Molter, Beate & Glockner, Andreas, 2004. "Oops, I did it again--relapse errors in routinized decision making," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 93(1), pages 62-74, January.
    3. Jordan Vazquez & Cécile Godé & Jean-Fabrice Lebraty, 2019. "Environnement big data et prise de décision intuitive : le cas de la Police Nationale des Bouches du Rhône," Post-Print halshs-02188451, HAL.
    4. Spassova, Gerri & Palmeira, Mauricio & Andrade, Eduardo B., 2018. "A ratings pattern heuristic in judgments of expertise: When being right Looks wrong," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 147(C), pages 26-47.
    5. Jordan Vazquez & Cécile Godé & Jean-Fabrice Lebraty, 2017. "Les enjeux des environnements big data pour la Police Nationale," Post-Print halshs-02188803, HAL.
    6. Clayton Wukich & Scott E. Robinson, 2013. "Leadership Strategies at the Meso Level of Emergency Management Networks," International Review of Public Administration, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 18(1), pages 41-59, April.
    7. Mauksch, Stefanie & von der Gracht, Heiko A. & Gordon, Theodore J., 2020. "Who is an expert for foresight? A review of identification methods," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 154(C).
    8. Tomer Geva & Maytal Saar‐Tsechansky, 2021. "Who Is a Better Decision Maker? Data‐Driven Expert Ranking Under Unobserved Quality," Production and Operations Management, Production and Operations Management Society, vol. 30(1), pages 127-144, January.
    9. Greg Fisher & Emily Neubert, 2023. "Evaluating Ventures Fast and Slow: Sensemaking, Intuition, and Deliberation in Entrepreneurial Resource Provision Decisions," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 47(4), pages 1298-1326, July.
    10. Oliver Schnusenberg & Andrés Gallo, 2011. "On Cognitive Ability and Learning in a Beauty Contest," Journal for Economic Educators, Middle Tennessee State University, Business and Economic Research Center, vol. 11(2), pages 13-24, Fall.
    11. Edgar Ricardo Soto-Equihua & Claudia Ivonne Ramírez-Silva & Juana Elizabeth Elton-Puente & Jorge Luis Chávez-Servín & Pablo Gutiérrez-Lara & Elsa Fernanda Chávez-Alabat & María del Carmen Caamaño & Ka, 2022. "Design and Validation of a Food Frequency Questionnaire to Evaluate the Consumption of Trans Fatty Acids in the Adult Population (FFQ-TFA)," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(20), pages 1-16, October.
    12. Jordan Vazquez & Cécile Godé & Jean-Fabrice Lebraty, 2021. "Environnement big data et prise de décision : maintien de l'ordre durant un évènement sportif d'ampleur," Post-Print hal-03252399, HAL.
    13. Aurel Mircea NITA & Ionela Gabriela SOLOMON, 2015. "The Role Of Intuition And Decision Making In Public Administration," Curentul Juridic, The Juridical Current, Le Courant Juridique, Petru Maior University, Faculty of Economics Law and Administrative Sciences and Pro Iure Foundation, vol. 61, pages 84-93, June.
    14. Alós-Ferrer, Carlos & Strack, Fritz, 2014. "From dual processes to multiple selves: Implications for economic behavior," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 1-11.
    15. Steve Clarke, 2010. "Cognitive bias and the precautionary principle: what's wrong with the core argument in Sunstein's Laws of Fear and a way to fix it," Journal of Risk Research, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 13(2), pages 163-174, March.
    16. repec:cup:judgdm:v:3:y:2008:i::p:215-228 is not listed on IDEAS
    17. Haupt Brittany, 2021. "The Use of Crisis Communication Strategies in Emergency Management," Journal of Homeland Security and Emergency Management, De Gruyter, vol. 18(2), pages 125-150.
    18. Trotman, Ken T. & Bauer, Tim D. & Humphreys, Kerry A., 2015. "Group judgment and decision making in auditing: Past and future research," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 56-72.
    19. Weber, Elke U. & Johnson, Eric J., 2012. "Psychology and behavioral economics lessons for the design of a green growth strategy," Policy Research Working Paper Series 6240, The World Bank.
    20. Gevaert, Koen & Keinemans, Sabrina & Roose, Rudi, 2018. "Deciding on priorities in youth care: A systematic literature review," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 95(C), pages 191-199.
    21. Ken T. Trotman & Roger Simnett & Amna Khalifa, 2009. "Impact of the Type of Audit Team Discussions on Auditors' Generation of Material Frauds," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 26(4), pages 1115-1142, December.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wly:jocnur:v:19:y:2010:i:9-10:p:1298-1306. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://doi.org/10.1111/(ISSN)1365-2702 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.