Differences in cultural competence between nursing students in academic and professional programs

Objective: Multicultural phenomena require nursing students to have cultural competence. Nursing students who are culturally competent can understand more about patients’ issues with regard to cultural diversity and equality when delivering culturally sensitive care. This study aims to identify cultural competence across educational levels. Methods: This study involves 164 students of a second-semester professional program and an eighth-semester academic program. This study employs a cross-sectional design and a stratified random-sampling technique. The questionnaire used is modified from related concepts and theories of culture care and cultural competence. Results: The results show that the average cultural-competence scores of second-semester professional students and eighth-semester academic students are 60.0 and 59.0, respectively (p = 0.283; alpha = 0.05). Conclusions: Based on the results of the statistical tests, there was no significant statistical difference in cultural competence between second-semester professional students and eight-semester academic students. Further research is needed to examine the factors affecting cultural competence of students.