An Examination of the Role Discrepancy, Depressive symptoms, and Turnover Intention among the Jordanian Nursing Workforce

Globally, nursing shortage is affecting all components of patient care process, especially in the developing countries due to their lack of resources. Literature identified nurses’ dissatisfaction with work environment and turnover as causes for the shortage, and the ambiguity of nurses’ role as a cause for dissatisfaction. So, exploring nurses’ role, as a part of their work environment, from nurses’ perspectives is believed to formulate a compatible environment that is more appealing to nurses to stay.Using the person-environment fit theory, this study tried (a) to describe role discrepancy, depressive symptoms, and turnover intention among the Jordanian ICU RNs; and (b) to examine the relationship of role discrepancy with nurses' depressive symptoms and turnover intention. Using a descriptive correlational cross-sectional design, a convenience sample of 114 RNs from 8 ICU units, at the JUH, who were recruited and surveyed through interviews and self-administered questionnaires. Analysis included descriptive statistics, correlations, paired and independent t-tests and polynomial regression analyses.Amongst the sample, 63.2% were females, 56.1% singles, and 93.9% holding the BSN degree, with average age 27.1 years, average period of nursing experience 4.7 years, and 3.9 years in current ICU. Nurses rated their satisfaction with their salary, work, and work environment as 5.6, 5.4, and 4.2, out of 10, respectively.Nurses’ ideal role conception was higher than their actual role (4.26 vs. 3.14, respectively, p < .05). Their reported level of depressive symptoms was 26.68, out of 60. Participants’ average turnover intention was reported to be 3.59, with their professional turnover intention higher than their organizational turnover intention (3.71 vs. 3.4, respectively, p < .05).Nurses’ perception of role discrepancy was not found to have a statistically significant relationship with nurses’ level of depressive symptoms or turnover intention. So, the hypothesized curvilinear relationship was not found useful to explain the relationship between the components of the role discrepancy with depressive symptoms or turnover intention. However, the low reliability and validity results of the NRCS and the modified WCS caused the results to be cautiously taken, and limited the generalizability of the findings. Further examination of those two instruments is recommended.