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Women 's Experiences Towards Becoming A Nurse Clinician Essay

Decent Essays

Literature Review

There is a great deal of research that examines women’s experiences in non-traditional occupations, but there is limited research on men’s experiences in non-traditional (i.e., female-dominated) fields. Nursing has become female-dominated, and we are interested in examining the male experience in a female-dominated occupation by exploring how gender identity influences a man’s work as a nurse, and how the experience of being male frames his career trajectory toward becoming a nurse clinician.

Nursing is a profession dominated by women. Approximately 93% of nurses are female (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Health Resources and Services Administration, 2008). When entering such a female-dominated field, male nursing students encounter many challenges in their training. The academic literature suggests that males in nursing programs feel isolated, marginalized, and discriminated by their professors and peers (Sedgwick, Kellet, 2015; Kelly, Shoemaker and Steele, 1996). These negative feelings may derive from societal stereotypes, prejudices, and the lack of male role models in nursing (Clow, Ricciardelli, & Bartfay, 2015). Despite the numerous challenges they encounter, researchers have reported certain privileges that come from being a male in nursing. For example, males tend to garner more power, money, and respect than their female peers. Williams (1995), described this phenomenon as “the glass escalator” (in contrast to the female

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