Mediating role of gender-related personality traits in the relationship between identity styles, attachment with self-differentiation in nurse students

Introduction: Self-differentiation is the most important concept of the theory of family systems and shows the level of ability of a person to distinguish his intellectual and emotional processes from others. The purpose of the present study was to investigate the mediating role of gender-related personality traits in the relationship between identity styles, attachment with self-differentiation in nursing students. Methods: The research method was structural equation and the statistical population of the study consisted of all students of the Faculty of Nursing, Tehran University of Medical Sciences during the academic year of 2018. Regarding the number of variables observed in the study, 300 students were selected by available sampling method. The research instruments were self-differentiation questionnaire DSI-R, Berzensky identity style questionnaire, Spence personality traits questionnaire, and adult attachment styles. The collected data were analyzed using regression equation method. Results: The findings of the study showed that there was a significant relationship between gender-related personality traits, identity styles and attachment styles with self-differentiation (P≤0.001), as well as gender-related personality (β=-.20, P≤0.001), identity (β=-.31, P≤0.001), and attachment (β=-.20, P≤0.001) had effect on self-differentiation. gender-related personality traits is the mediator in the relationship between identity styles, attachment  with self-differentiation, so the research model has been confirmed. Conclusion: Based on the results, it can be argued that in order to reduce self-differentiation as a negative psychological factor, attention to the identity styles and attachment as an interpersonal factor is essential in the field of personality dimensions of nursing students.