Associations of empathy, occupational commitment, and ego-resilience with perceived stress among nurses in non-family-accompanied care wards

To examine the association between empathy and perceived stress among nurses in non-family-accompanied care wards and to explore the potential mediating roles of occupational commitment and ego-resilience. A convenient sampling method was employed to recruit 359 nurses from non-family-accompanied care wards in eight tertiary Grade A hospitals in Fujian Province from March to June 2025. The perceived stress, empathy, occupational commitment, and ego-resilience were assessed using the Chinese versions of the Jefferson Scale of Empathy-Health Professionals (JSE-HP), the Chinese Perceived Stress Scale (CPSS), the Measurement of Occupational Commitment (MOC), and the Ego-Resilience Scale (ERS), respectively.

Chain mediation analysis was conducted to examine the potential indirect associations among these variables. Nurses in non-family-accompanied care wards reported a moderate level of perceived stress (35.38 ± 8.42), with significant differences observed across clinical departments (P