BACCALAUREATE STUDENTS?? IMAGES OF NURSING A Follow-Up Report

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Abstract
Summary In this follow-up report of a longitudinal study of changes in occupational imagery among baccalaureate students at the University of California School of Nursing in San Francisco, it was found that from time of entry into the school until graduation three years later: 1. Students came increasingly to characterize nursing and what they valued in it in terms of advanced professional images of the field. 2. Complementary to this trend, a larger proportion of them came to reject bureaucratic images of the field, although, surprisingly, a fair number continued to hold onto certain layman images. 3. Despite these trends, however, students do not achieve greater consensus among themselves concerning what they believed did and did not characterize nursing. They did reach higher consensus, though, on what in nursing they viewed as important or not important for the self. 4. Except for their increasing endorsement of advanced professional images for both nursing and self, in the main they did not effect a closer correspondence within themselves (i.e., grow more consonant) between what they saw in nursing and what they valued therein. These findings confirm in nearly every respect the changes and trends in occupational imagery which we reported on in this journal following the students' completion of their first year of baccalaureate nursing education. By their very nature, the findings suggest the need for major revisions in the traditional conceptual model of professional socialization propounded in contemporary sociological theory.

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