Nursing students' resilience, depression, well-being, and academic distress: Testing a moderated mediation model

Aim Academic distress is a leading cause of attrition among nursing students. The present study tested a positive psychology-oriented model detailing the potential links between nursing students': (a) psychological resilience; (b) depressive symptoms; (c) intrapersonal well-being; (d) interpersonal well-being; and (e) academic distress. Additionally, we tested whether the academic benefits of resilience were conditional upon nursing students' perceptions of their campus climate as supportive of mental health and well-being. Design A correlational, cross-sectional design was employed. Method Nursing students (N = 933) were selected from the national 2017-2018 Healthy Minds Study (HMS). Students completed measures of resilience, depressive symptoms, intrapersonal well-being (flourishing), interpersonal well-being (belonging), and academic distress. Results Conditional process modelling tested depression, belonging, and flourishing as mediators of the associations between resilience and academic distress variables. Furthermore, perceptions of campus climate were included as potential moderators of these mediation effects. Results indicated that the protective academic benefits of resilience were primarily explained by decreases in depression but that this effect was strongest for nursing students with negative perceptions of their campus climate. Conclusion Findings highlight the psychological and academic benefits of greater resilience and the moderated mediation results suggest that such benefits were conditional on the broader campus climate. Impact Nurse educators and policymakers should consider addressing contextual factors, such as campus climate, in addition to resilience training in their efforts to reduce the negative academic impacts of mental health problems and stress in nursing school.