Emotional displays: Nurse educators engaging and reflecting on their own emotional displays in preparing nursing students for the emotional complexities of nursing practice.

In everyday practice nurses including student nurses, face many situations which can trigger a range of their own emotions, but they also deal with a variety of emotions in patients, patients' relatives and colleagues. There is a need for nurses and those involved in nurse education to understand how emotions impact on professional practice. Yet, while nursing practice involves working often in emotional circumstances, there has been little attention by educational institutions and employers on developing the ability of nurses to understand and manage the emotional demands inherent in their role. This paper examines emotions and their relationship to and appropriateness in nursing practice and education. In particular it examines whether self-understanding by attendance to emotions can enhance the role of nurses educators in preparing nursing students for the complexities of modern nursing practice.