Reflective practice and knowledge development: Transforming research for a practice-based discipline
Gwen Sherwood
Abstract
Knowledge development to guide evidence-informed practice is a cornerstone of nursing as a practice-based discipline. The emphasis on empirical knowledge development overshadows other ways of knowledge development—personal, aesthetic, and ethical. Technical, objective knowledge development is more dominant than knowledge development for delivering holistic, person-centered care. Personal, aesthetic, and ethical ways of knowing are essential factors in satisfying work environments, patient satisfaction, and nurse retention. Boyer’s model of scholarship development defining the scholarship of discovery, teaching, application, and integration guide nurses in building programs of scholarship informing the practice of nursing in practice and academia with an aim of improving and transforming healthcare delivery and patient outcomes. The purpose of the paper is to describe the various forms of scholarship described by Boyer as priorities in knowledge development, examine how the multiple ways of knowing expand traditional empirical perspectives of knowledge development, and present the value of reflective practices that undergird knowledge generation, integration, and application for holistic person-centered safe quality care. Reflective practices have a unique contribution to forming the unique art and science of nursing as a practice-based discipline. Transforming perspectives on knowledge development incorporate reflective practices, igniting a spirit of inquiry for developing the ontology, epistemology, and praxis for delivering holistic, person-centered, safe, quality care. By developing a growth mindset for continuous improvement of their practice, nurses engage in the ongoing search for evidence informed practice.