Patricia Benner: From Novice to Expert

________ developed a concept known as From Novice to Expert in 1982

Patricia Benner was born on August ____; Hampton Virginia, United States.

BA in Nursing - Pasadena College/Point Loma College in ____

PhD - 1982 from ____________ at Berkeley

Benner published _ books and numerous articles

Benner received _________ from AJN in 1984, 1990, 1996, 2000

• is described as a caring relationship, an “enabling condition of connection and concern.”

• is viewed as a caring practice whose science is guided by the moral art and ethics of care and responsibility.

• Dr. Benner understands that nursing practice as the care and study of the lived experience of health, illness, and disease and the relationships among the three elements.

“The _______ is a self-interpreting being, that is the person does not come into the world predefined but gets defined in the course of living a life.”

Major aspects of understanding that the person must deal as:

• focuses on the lived experience of being healthy and being ill.

• _______ is defined as what can be assessed, whereas wellbeing is the human experience of health or wholeness.

• Wellbeing and being ill are understood as distinct ways of being in the world.

• Benner uses situation rather than environment because situation conveys a social environment with social definition and meaningfulness

• “To be situated implies that one has a past, present, and future and that all of these aspects....influence the current situation.”

• This concept explains that nurses develop skills and an understanding of patient care over time from a combination of a strong educational foundation and personal experiences.

• Dr Benner proposed that a nurse could gain knowledge and skills without actually learning a theory. She describes this as a nurse “knowing how” without “knowing that.” She further explains that the development of knowledge in fields such as nursing is made up of the extension of knowledge through research and understanding through clinical experience.

The theory identifies five levels of nursing experience: (these are levels of nursing experience)

• Beginner with no experience

• Taught general rules to help perform tasks

• Rules are: context – free, independent of specific cases and applied universally

• Rule-governed behavior is limited and inflexible

• Exs: “Tell me what I need to do and I’ll do it”

• Demonstrates acceptable performance

• Has gained prior experience in actual situations to recognize recurring meaningful components

• Principles, based on experiences begin to be formulated to guide actions

• Typically, a nurse with 2-3 years experiences on the job in the same area or in similar day-to-day situations

• More aware of long-term goals

• Gains perspective from planning own actions based on conscious abstract and analytical thinking and helps to achieve greater efficiency and organization

• Perceives and understands situations as whole parts

• More holistic understanding improves decision-making

• Learns from experiences what to expect in certain situations and how to modify plans

• No longer relies on principles, rules, or guidelines to connect situations and determine actions

• Much more background of experience

• Has intuitive grasp of clinical situations

• Performance is now fluid, flexible and highly-proficient

• Movement from relying on abstract principles to using past concrete experiences to guide actions

• Change in learner's perception of situations as whole parts rather than in separate pieces

• Passage from a detached observer to an involved performer, no longer outside the situation but now actively engaged in participation