J Clin Nurs. 2008 Jul;17(14):1834-42.

Mentorship in contemporary practice: the

experiences of nursing students and
practice mentors.
Myall M, Levett-Jones T, Lathlean J.

Department of Primary Care & Population Sciences, University College London,

London, UK. M.Myall@pcps.ucl.ac.uk

AIM: This paper explores the role of the mentor in contemporary nursing practice in the
UK. It presents findings from a recent study which investigated the impact of a locality-
based nursing education initiative on students, practice mentors and academic staff and
draws on another study, conducted in the same setting and two Australian sites, to
examine the perceptions of nursing students and mentors. BACKGROUND: Within
nursing, mentorship is integral to students' clinical placement experiences and has
attracted increasing interest among researchers. Despite a plethora of studies focussing on
mentoring and its nature and application within the practice setting, limited attention has
been paid to the extent to which guidelines provided by regulatory bodies for nursing
inform and influence the practice of mentoring in contemporary health-care settings.
DESIGN: The study used a two-phased design with data on mentorship being focussed
on the second phase. METHOD: Data were collected using an online survey
questionnaire of pre-qualifying students and a postal questionnaire for practice mentors.
FINDINGS: The findings highlight the importance of mentorship for prequalifying
students and emphasise the need to provide mentors with adequate preparation and
support. They confirm previous research, but also highlight improvements in bridging the
gap between rhetoric and reality for mentorship. Results are further strengthened when
compared with those of the second study. CONCLUSIONS: Findings provide new
evidence of a narrowing of the gap between the theory and practice of mentoring and for
the continuing implementation of national standards to clarify the roles and
responsibilities of the mentor. They also suggest the benefits of developing such
standards in countries with similar systems of support for nursing students.
RELEVANCE TO CLINICAL PRACTICE: Mentorship is pivotal to students' clinical
experiences and is instrumental in preparing them for their role as confident and
competent practitioners.

PMID: 18578757 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

Social Learning Theory (Bandura)
Summary: Bandura’s Social Learning Theory posits that people learn from one another,
via observation, imitation, and modeling. The theory has often been called a bridge
between behaviorist and cognitive learning theories because it encompasses attention,
memory, and motivation.

Originator: Albert Bandura

Key Terms: Modeling, reciprocal determinism

Social Learning Theory (Bandura)

People learn through observing others’ behavior, attitudes, and outcomes of those
behaviors. “Most human behavior is learned observationally through modeling: from
observing others, one forms an idea of how new behaviors are performed, and on later
occasions this coded information serves as a guide for action.” (Bandura). Social learning
theory explains human behavior in terms of continuous reciprocal interaction between
cognitive, behavioral, and environmental influences.

Necessary conditions for effective modeling:

1. Attention — various factors increase or decrease the amount of attention paid.

Includes distinctiveness, affective valence, prevalence, complexity, functional
value. One’s characteristics (e.g. sensory capacities, arousal level, perceptual set,
past reinforcement) affect attention.
2. Retention — remembering what you paid attention to. Includes symbolic coding,
mental images, cognitive organization, symbolic rehearsal, motor rehearsal
3. Reproduction — reproducing the image. Including physical capabilities, and self-
observation of reproduction.
4. Motivation — having a good reason to imitate. Includes motives such as past
(i.e. traditional behaviorism), promised (imagined incentives) and vicarious
(seeing and recalling the reinforced model)

Bandura believed in “reciprocal determinism”, that is, the world and a person’s behavior
cause each other, while behaviorism essentially states that one’s environment causes
one’s behavior, Bandura, who was studying adolescent aggression, found this too
simplistic, and so in addition he suggested that behavior causes environment as well.
Later, Bandura soon considered personality as an interaction between three components:
the environment, behavior, and one’s psychological processes (one’s ability to entertain
images in minds and language).

Social learning theory has sometimes been called a bridge between behaviorist and
cognitive learning theories because it encompasses attention, memory, and motivation.
The theory is related to Vygotsky’s Social Development Theory and Lave’s Situated
Learning, which also emphasize the importance of social learning.

Abstract:

A mentoring relationship has the potential to be widely used throughout an individual’s

lifespan. Including mentoring relationships into one’s life can assist with transition
management in and out of various life scenarios. A mentoring model has been proposed
that blends human development with the dimensions of mentoring. It is assumed that the
dimensions of the model are continuous and multidimensional. We recognize three
interactive dimensions that surround the mentoring interaction which shape the mentor
and protege relationship. These dimensions are defined as: socialization; task
development; and lifespan development. The model can be utilized as a diagnostic tool or
as a training model to promote mentoring relationships.

Mentoring is a multidimensionalrelationship that energizes personal andprofessional

growth. This article exploresthe concept of mentoring in nursing andpresents a
mentorship model basedon a caring philosophy. The RN–studentnurse mentoring
program cited is the resultof a collaborative commitment between acommunity hospital
and two colleges.Discussed are the experience, process,insights, and impact of the
program as aretention and professional development tool.

The standard definition of mentor reflects a wisecounselor and trusted teacher,

personified by themythological character, Mentor (Donovan, 1990). May,Meleis, and
Winstead-Fry (1982) defined mentoring as‘‘an intense relationship’’ between novice and
a wise,knowledgeable person, whereas Andrews and Wallis(1993) defined it as a ‘‘long-
term relationship’’ thatpromotes the novice’s well-being. Other descriptionsinclude ‘‘a
special way to transfer knowledge’’ (Byrne &Keefe, 2002), ‘‘a learning relationship’’
(Dingman,2002), a ‘‘critical companionship’’ (Titchen, 2003), and ‘‘a process in which
two or more people create aconnection and safe environment that allow healingtruth and
wisdom to be discovered’’ (Swanson, 2000,p. 31).The roles of mentoring, precepting,
supervising, facili-tating, and teaching are often equated. However, mentor-ing is a
broader role that encompasses formal or informalsupporting, guiding, coaching, teaching,
role modeling,counseling,advocating,networking,andsharing(Andrews& Wallis, 1999;
Tourigny & Pulich, 2005; Vance, 2002a).Mentoring occurs within or outside the clinical
settingand includes personal and career guidance (Kram, 1985;Yoder, 1990). Several
authors claim that mentoring doesnot include a supervisory or professional evaluative
role(Andrews & Wallis, 1999; Byrne & Keefe, 2002).The mentoring process is a
longitudinal relation-ship that develops through at least four stages over time,ranging
from months to many years (Atkins & Williams,1995; Cohen, 1999; Earnshaw, 1995;
Greene & Puetzer,2002). Shaffer et al. (2000) listed the stages as
initiation,cultivation,separation,andredefinition.Thefirststageofinitiation involves mentor
and mentee meeting, gettingtoknoweachother,andsettinggoals.Toensurethebestsuccess in
relationship building, Darling (1984) sug-
gestedthatmentoringandbeingmentoredarevoluntaryendeavors and the pairing should be
self-selecting. As atrusting relationship matures, the pair moves to thesecond stage of
cultivation, during which information isshared; joint problem solving promotes respectful
con-frontation of decisions and exploration of alternatives.Successful mentoring
empowers the mentee to moveforward in his or her career and personal life. Thisprocess
leads the pair to the third stage of separationfrom their original novice–expert roles and
allows for afourth stage of mutually redefining the mentoringrelationship toward long-
term friendship or goingseparate ways.Building relationships requires time together. Al-
though some authors suggest ‘‘e-mail relationships’’(Field, 2003; Kalisch, 2005), initial
and periodic face-to-face meetings build more lasting partnerships (Andrews& Wallis,
1999). In addition, certain personal attributes,summarized in Table 1, appear to make the
mentoringexperience more successful (Atkins & Williams, 1995;Cohen, 1999; Darling,
1984). Although some attributesdevelop throughout the mentoring experience, the
keytraits of honesty, respect, commitment of time andself, and communication skills are
essential from thebeginning. These mentoring attributes highly correlatewith those
identified as caring attributes.