📄 social_science

The Relationship Between Professional Commitment and Perceived Clinical Competence Among Undergraduate Operating Room and Anesthesia Technology Students: A Cross-Sectional Correlational Study

This 2025 cross-sectional study of 150 undergraduate students in Iran found that higher professional commitment, particularly affective and normative commitment, along with greater academic interest and GPA, are significantly and positively associated with higher perceived clinical competence in operating room and anesthesia technology students.

Original authors: Shiva Sadeghi Meymand, Yaser Abolhasani, Yaser Soltanmoradi, Mohammad Hossein Shakeri Gooki, Hossein Hasaninejad

Published 2026-08-25

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CC BY 4.0

Original authors: Shiva Sadeghi Meymand, Yaser Abolhasani, Yaser Soltanmoradi, Mohammad Hossein Shakeri Gooki, Hossein Hasaninejad

Original paper licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). ✨ This is an AI-generated explanation of the paper below. It is not written or endorsed by the authors. For technical accuracy, refer to the original paper. Read full disclaimer

In the high-stakes environment of a hospital operating room, the quality of care a patient receives depends on two invisible but powerful forces working in tandem. The first is clinical competence: the tangible ability to perform complex medical tasks, apply knowledge, and make sound judgments under pressure. The second is professional commitment, a deep psychological attachment to the medical field that drives a person to stay dedicated, take responsibility, and care deeply about their role. While medical schools spend years teaching students the technical skills required to save lives, less is known about how their emotional dedication to the profession influences their own sense of being capable. Understanding the link between how much a student loves their future job and how confident they feel in their hands-on abilities is crucial for shaping the next generation of healthcare workers.

Researchers at Rafsanjan University of Medical Sciences in Iran set out to explore this connection among undergraduate students training to become operating room technicians and anesthesia specialists. They focused on a specific group of 150 students who were deep enough in their studies to have clinical exposure but had not yet begun working professionally. The team wanted to see if a student's level of dedication to their chosen career path was related to how they judged their own clinical skills. To measure this, the researchers asked the students to fill out detailed surveys. One survey asked them to rate their feelings about their profession, breaking this down into three parts: how much they emotionally loved the work, how much they felt a moral duty to do it, and how much they felt they had to stay because of the costs of leaving. Another survey asked them to rate their own perceived competence across various areas, from basic knowledge and leadership skills to empathy and interaction with colleagues.

The results revealed a clear and strong pattern. Students who reported higher levels of professional commitment also reported higher levels of perceived clinical competence. Specifically, the researchers found that the more emotionally attached a student was to their future profession, and the more they felt a sense of obligation to it, the more confident they felt in their clinical abilities. Interestingly, the type of commitment based on the fear of losing what they had invested did not show a significant link to their confidence. Beyond their feelings about the profession, the students' academic performance and their personal interest in the subject also played a role. Those with higher grade point averages and those who expressed a stronger personal interest in their field of study tended to feel more clinically competent. When the researchers combined these factors, they found that professional commitment, interest in the field, and academic grades together explained nearly half of the differences in how confident the students felt about their skills.

However, the researchers are careful to note that this study shows a relationship, not a cause-and-effect chain. Because the data was collected at a single point in time through self-reported surveys, it is impossible to say whether feeling committed makes a student more competent, or whether feeling competent makes a student more committed. It is also possible that other factors, such as the learning environment or a student's natural self-belief, influence both. The study was conducted at a single university with a specific group of students, all of whom were single and relatively young, which means the findings might look different in other settings or among older, married professionals. Despite these limitations, the study offers a valuable snapshot of the student experience, suggesting that educational programs might benefit from focusing not just on technical training, but also on fostering a genuine sense of professional identity and motivation. By nurturing a student's emotional connection to their future role, educators may inadvertently support the development of the confidence needed to perform those roles effectively.

Technical Summary: Professional Commitment and Perceived Clinical Competence Among Undergraduate Operating Room and Anesthesia Technology Students

Problem Statement
In high-risk clinical environments such as operating rooms, the quality of care relies heavily on two critical factors: the professional commitment of healthcare personnel and their clinical competence. While existing literature in Iran has examined professional commitment and clinical competence as separate constructs among health sciences students, there is a significant gap in understanding the simultaneous relationship between these two variables, specifically within the fields of Operating Room Technology and Anesthesia Technology. Previous studies have addressed these concepts individually or in different populations (e.g., educational experts or nursing students), but no comprehensive study has investigated how professional commitment correlates with perceived clinical competence among undergraduate students in these specific allied health disciplines. This study aims to fill that knowledge gap to inform educational planning and curriculum development.

Methodology
This research employed a cross-sectional correlational design conducted in 2025 at Rafsanjan University of Medical Sciences, Iran.

Participants: The study utilized a census sampling method to recruit 150 eligible undergraduate students majoring in Operating Room Technology and Anesthesia Technology. Inclusion criteria required enrollment in the second semester or beyond, no history of university transfer, no prior professional operating room experience, and willingness to participate.
Instruments: Data were collected using three tools:
1. A demographic questionnaire (age, sex, marital status, field of study, GPA, interest level).
2. The Meyer and Allen Professional Commitment Questionnaire (18 items), assessing three dimensions: affective, continuance, and normative commitment. Internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha) was 0.87.
3. The Perceived Clinical Competence Questionnaire (45 items), adapted from Arab-Khazaei et al., evaluating six dimensions of competence. Internal consistency was 0.92.
Statistical Analysis: Data were analyzed using SPSS version 26. Descriptive statistics, Pearson's correlation coefficients, independent-samples t-tests, ANOVA, and multiple linear regression (Enter method) were utilized. The significance level was set at 0.05.

Key Results

Descriptive Statistics: The mean professional commitment score was 61.3 ± 9.8 (out of 90), and the mean perceived clinical competence score was 168.7 ± 24.3 (out of 225). Among commitment dimensions, affective commitment scored highest (22.1 ± 3.8), followed by normative (21.6 ± 3.2), with continuance commitment lowest (17.6 ± 4.1).
Correlations: A significant positive correlation was found between overall professional commitment and perceived clinical competence ( $r = 0.63, p < 0.001$ $r = 0.63, p < 0.001$ ).
- Affective commitment ( $r = 0.58, p < 0.001$ ) and normative commitment ( $r = 0.51, p = 0.002$ ) showed significant positive correlations with clinical competence.
- Continuance commitment showed no statistically significant correlation ( $r = 0.15, p = 0.062$ ).
- GPA ( $r = 0.41, p < 0.001$ ) and interest in the field ( $r = 0.49, p < 0.001$ ) were also significantly positively associated with perceived clinical competence.
Regression Analysis: Multiple linear regression identified three independent predictors of perceived clinical competence:
1. Overall professional commitment ( $\beta = 0.48, p < 0.001$ ) – the strongest predictor.
2. Interest in the field ( $\beta = 0.22, p = 0.003$ ).
3. GPA ( $\beta = 0.18, p = 0.012$ ).
  The model explained 49.3% of the variance in perceived clinical competence scores ( $R^2 = 0.493$ ).
Demographics: No significant associations were found between the main variables and age or sex. All participants were single, precluding analysis of marital status.

Key Contributions
The study provides empirical evidence linking professional commitment to perceived clinical competence specifically within the context of Operating Room and Anesthesia Technology students in Iran. It distinguishes the impact of different commitment dimensions, highlighting that emotional attachment (affective) and sense of obligation (normative) are more strongly linked to competence perceptions than the perceived cost of leaving (continuance). Furthermore, it quantifies the independent contribution of academic achievement (GPA) and intrinsic motivation (interest) alongside professional commitment in predicting students' self-assessed competence.

Significance and Claims
The authors claim that higher professional commitment is associated with higher levels of perceived clinical competence among these students. They posit that educational planning should not be limited to knowledge and skill acquisition but must also address professional attributes, motivation, and identity formation.

However, the paper maintains a modest stance regarding its claims:

Causality: Due to the cross-sectional design, the authors explicitly state that causal inferences cannot be made. The findings demonstrate associations, not that commitment causes competence.
Measurement: The study relies on self-reported data for both commitment and competence. The authors acknowledge that "perceived clinical competence" may not equate to actual objective clinical performance, as no instructor evaluations or direct observations were conducted.
Generalizability: The findings are limited to a single university in Iran, and the authors caution against broad generalization without further multi-center studies.

In conclusion, the study suggests that attention to professional commitment and academic motivation, alongside supportive educational environments, may be valuable components of educational planning for these students, but calls for longitudinal and interventional studies with objective competence assessments to further validate these relationships.

Technical Summary: Professional Commitment and Perceived Clinical Competence Among Undergraduate Operating Room and Anesthesia Technology Students

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