Healthcare Students’ Anxiety, Cognitive Load, and Trait-mindfulness during Interprofessional obstetric Simulation Training

Abstract

Simulation anxiety can hinder healthcare students' learning. Trait-mindfulness may help reduce learners' anxiety and improve their cognitive load during simulation training. However, the relationship between healthcare students' anxiety, trait mindfulness, and cognitive load has not been studied together during undergraduate interprofessional obstetric emergency simulation training. This observational correlational research examined the relationship between healthcare students' anxiety, trait-mindfulness, and cognitive load. Furthermore, it examined whether healthcare students' trait-mindfulness can moderate the effect of anxiety on cognitive load during undergraduate interprofessional obstetric emergency simulation training. Forty-six undergraduate medical and nursing students were enrolled in this study. Each participant (in a team of 3 to 4) completed one postpartum hemorrhage scenario. The French versions of the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI-Y; Gauthier & Bouchard, 1993), the Mindfulness Attention Awareness Scale (Germann et al., 2009), and Paas’s cognitive load scale (Paas, 1992) were used to measure anxiety, trait-mindfulness, and cognitive load, respectively. The study results show a positive correlation between healthcare students’ state-anxiety and cognitive load. Additionally, healthcare students’ mindfulness moderated the effect of state-anxiety on cognitive load during simulation training. As a personality trait, healthcare students’ mindfulness is associated with reduced simulation anxiety and improved cognitive load during obstetric emergency simulation training. Besides the learning tasks and simulation environment characteristics, simulation instructors should consider healthcare students’ anxiety and mindfulness to optimize their cognitive load during simulation training. The study demonstrated that healthcare students’ trait mindfulness mitigates the magnitude of simulation anxiety on cognitive load during emergency simulation training. It suggests further examining healthcare students’ personality traits to detect potential interactions of their traits with the simulation learning process.