Abstract: Objective To explore the classification and influencing factors of stress of conscience in nurses. Methods Convenience sampling was used to select 1,120 nurses from 2 tertiary grade-A hospitals in Shandong province from April to October 2021. General information questionnaire, Hospital Ethical Climate Survey, and Stress of Conscience Questionnaire were used to conduct the survey. Latent profile analysis was used to explore the classification of stress of conscience, and disordered multinomial logistic regression to analyze the influencing factors of each profile. Results The stress of conscience of nurses could be divided into low stress of conscience group (67.41%), medium stress of conscience group (23.84%) and high stress of conscience group (8.75%). Higher first degree (OR=1.353, P=0.001) and poorer hospital ethical climate (OR=0.954, P<0.001) were predictors of medium stress of conscience group. Female (OR=0.382, P=0.042), longer working hours in the last week (OR=0.349, P=0.003) and poorer hospital ethical climate (OR=0.938, P<0.001) were predictors of high stress of conscience group. Conclusion There is heterogeneity in the stress of conscience among nurses. Sex, first degree, working hours in the last week and hospital ethical climate are important predictors of the latent categories regarding stress of conscience among nursing staff. Nursing managers should pay attention to different nurses’ stress of conscience according to the sex and educational background. Rational allocation of human resources and good hospital ethical climate are beneficial to reducing the level of stress of conscience.

Key words: nursing staff, latent profile analysis, stress of conscience, hospital ethical climate, influencing factor