This study focuses on the interaction between the nursing student and the socializing institution in an attempt to learn more about the transformation of a "lay person" into a highly specialized professional. The theoretical assumptions of socialization fall loosely within a symbolic interactionist (SI) framework which employs the notions of human agency and individual creativity. This study holds a view congruous with the student's active construction of her own identity in interaction with the school's environment. The structural elements of the school are approached not as deterministic attributes which coerce the student but as pathways which both enhance and limit the student's professional development as he/she traverses the program.

The cross-sectional data gathered provided a total population of 496 nursing students in three structurally different baccalaureate nursing programs which allowed for a valid comparative study of three groups of students. A questionnaire was administered to the student population. Two socialization dimensions were measured through the questionnaire data, namely, specialty choice and the development of professional images. These socialization dimensions provided two gateways into studying the emergence of the professional self in passage through the socializing structure of each school of nursing.

Three major findings emerged. First, the characteristics needed for an individual to fulfill the role of a nurse are so uniquely defined that the population attracted to nursing showed little variation between groups upon entry and an even greater predilection to become more alike following socialization. Second, during passage through the socializing institution dialectical tension was demonstrated between actor and structure as shown in the nonlinear trajectories of professional images and specialty choices. Third, the data strongly indicate that the clinical setting in which students observe and enact nurse roles should be carefully selected for congruity with the professional structure of the program. Clinical experiences provide situational contexts which determine the fate of role mastery and professional identity.