Attitudes and Prejudices of Nursing Students Towards Psychiatric Patients

It has been observed that, despite progress in medicine and education, negative opinions towards people suffering from psychological disorders are still present both in the general population and among health workers. An opinion is an acquired, relatively permanent, and stable structure composed of positive and negative emotions, evaluations, and reactions towards a certain object, whereas prejudices are mostly negative opinions towards a certain group of people or individuals. The purpose of this study was to determine what opinions nursing students have about psychologically ill people. The study was conducted at University Sjever, and the subjects were students of the nursery school. We used a specially structured, anonymous online survey, which contained 2 questions about age and sex and 10 questions related to opinions and prejudices about psychologically ill people; 162 students from all three study years took part in the research. The results are shown both as numbers and percentages. According to the results from the survey, students have different opinions towards psychologically ill people. During the study, the students have courses in which prejudices, stigmas, and people suffering from psychological illnesses are mentioned. Those courses could have reduced the number of prejudices, but despite that, the results of the research show that prejudices are still present. In order to reduce the prejudices, education and contact with the objects of those prejudices are the most important things.