An Exploration of the Relationship Between Knowledge and Performance‐Related Variables in High‐Fidelity Simulation: Designing Instruction That Promotes Expertise in Practice

ABSTRACT Increasingly, high‐fidelity patient simulation (HFPS) is becoming essential to nursing education. Much remains unknown about how classroom learning is connected to student decision‐making in simulation scenarios and the degree to which transference takes place between the classroom setting and actual practice. The present study was part of a larger pilot study aimed at determining the relationship between nursing students' clinical ability to prioritize their actions and the associated cognitions and physiologic outcomes of care using HFPS. In an effort to better explain the knowledge base being used by nursing students in HFPS, the investigators explored the relationship between common measures of knowledge and performance‐related variables. Findings are discussed within the context of the expert performance approach and concepts from cognitive psychology, such as cognitive architecture, cognitive load, memory, and transference.