Effects of Web‐based Career Identity Training for Stress Management among Japanese Nurses: A Randomized Control Trial

Job stress among hospital nurses is often high because of the high quantitative and qualitative nature of their workload. One of the main reasons is negative career identity (CI). Indeed, CI and the degree of role conflict in nurses has been found to be worse than in other occupations . CI is defined as the cognitive representation of self, derived from past work experiences, beliefs, values, attributes, and motives that define individuals in terms of their work roles . The reason for a relatively bad CI among Japanese nurses may be the low flexibility of the work style in Japanese hospitals. Many nurses desire to develop their professional skills and want their own careers to be compatible with their daily life-cycle . Methods reported for improving CI are similar to the methods used in career counseling, and should also be effective for use with Japanese nurses. Web-based training is comparatively low-cost and accessible compared to traditional classroom training. In fact, the effectiveness has been found to be the same as that of classroom training . In this study, to examine the effects of a web-based CI training program on nurses, changes in career identity and levels of job stress were examined among Japanese hospital nurses.