Nursing Students' Reading and English Aptitudes and Their Relationship to Discipline‐Specific Formal Writing Ability: A Descriptive Correlational Study

Abstract

ABSTRACT Formal writing assignments are commonly used in nursing education to develop students' critical thinking skills, as well as to enhance their communication abilities. However, writing apprehension is a common phenomenon among nursing students. It has been suggested that reading and English aptitudes are related to formal writing ability, yet neither the reading nor the English aptitudes of undergraduate nursing students have been described in the literature, and the relationships that reading and English aptitude have with formal writing ability have not been explored. The purpose of this descriptive correlational study was to describe writing apprehension and to assess the relationships among reading and English aptitude and discipline‐specific formal writing ability among undergraduate nursing students. The study sample consisted of 146 sophomores from one baccalaureate nursing program. The results indicated that both reading and English aptitude were related to students' formal writing ability.