Correlation between work stress and sleep quality in clinical nurses: The mediating effect of psychological resilience

BackgroundNurses face high-stress environments, which can lead to poor sleep quality and mental health issues.ObjectiveThis study investigated correlations among stress, psychological resilience, and sleep quality in nurses.MethodsA cross-sectional study design was adopted. Our targets were nurses who were working in general wards, intensive care units, and the emergency room at a hospital in northern Taiwan. A total of 120 valid questionnaires were obtained. The contents of the questionnaires included the Nursing Stress Scale, the Psychological Resilience Scale, and the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index. Baron and Kenny's mediating variable testing process was employed, as well as bootstrapping with 5000 resampled samples.ResultsA positive correlation was found between the Nursing Stress Scale and the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index, and a negative correlation was found between the Psychological Resilience Scale and the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index as well as between the Nursing Stress Scale and the Psychological Resilience Scale. Mediation analysis revealed that psychological resilience was associated with the relationship between stress and sleep quality; the protective role of the future structured style dimension was the most evident.ConclusionsOur results indicated that for nurses, poorer sleep quality is associated with higher levels of stress. In addition, greater psychological resilience was linked to better sleep quality, and nurses with a stronger future structured style tended to maintain better sleep quality.