The research question may be formulated as follows: What effects does training aimed at improving new nurses’ cultural competence have on patient satisfaction? The independent variable, in this case, is the training provided to nurses as it will remain unaffected. The focus is on nurses who have little working experience. This is another independent variable. The dependent variable is the patient satisfaction that may (or may not) be affected by some intervention (the training provided to nursing professionals).
The hypotheses can be as follows:
- The provision of training aimed at improving new nurses’ cultural competence results in improved patient satisfaction.
- The provision of training improves new nurses’ cultural competence.
The hypotheses in question are causal as they focus on causal relationships between the variables (Grove, Burns, & Gray, 2014). In both hypotheses, the effects of the provision of certain training are examined. These effects are the improvement of patient satisfaction and the improvement of nurses’ cultural competence. These hypotheses are simple as they explore relationships between two variables. In the first case, the relationship between training and patient satisfaction is explored while in the second hypothesis, the focus is on the relationship between training and nurses’ competence.
Both hypotheses under discussion are directional as the identify a specific direction the research will take (Trice & Bloom, 2015). It is mentioned that the training will improve patient satisfaction and will also have a positive effect on nurses’ competence, so a positive effect is expected. These are research hypotheses as they identify a specific relationship between the variables. In both cases, it is mentioned that there are certain effects of the training provided to nursing professionals.
References
Grove, S., Burns, N., & Gray, J. (2014). Understanding nursing research. St. Louis, MO: Elsevier Health Sciences.
Trice, L. B., & Bloom, K. C. (2015). Asking the right question. In C. Boswell & S. Cannon (Eds.), Gender identity and gender politics (pp. 215-232). Burlington, MA: Jones & Bartlett Publishers.