Introduction:

The social representation of nursing as a science and profession has deserved the attention of the investigation in terms of understanding what the view of nurses, other health professionals, teachers or laypeople are about the profession's references or nursing care.

Objetives:

To understand the social representation of the Nursing discipline and profession by students and tutors of the Nursing undergraduate course.

Methods:

Descriptive and comparative study based in a qualitative paradigm supported by the Theory of Social Representations. Non-probabilistic convenience sample consisting of 125 nursing students and 70 tutors. Data collection using a TALP, made available through an online questionnaire. Data analysis using Iramuteq 0.7 alpha 2 software.

Results:

From the analysis of the social representation of Nursing and of being a nurse in students’ perspective three categories emerge: nursing discipline, care and values, with a clear balance between care and values. The tutors' discourse is strongly anchored in the evocation of caring, helping, dedication and person.

Conclusions:

The structure of student’s representation changes over the course because of the modeling that is established during the supervisory relationship with nurse tutors. The tutors show to have a more structured social representation than that of the students due to their professional experiences and academic background. The tutors show to have a more structured social representation than that of the students due to their professional experiences and academic background.

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