Nursing, Caring, and Complexity Science: For Human ... - Axon

1: Philosophical and Theoretical Perspectives 9
Table 1.2 (Continued)
Concept
Polarity
and paradox:
order–disorder
Adaptable elements
Distributed control
Attractors
Definition
CAS are characterized
by a wholeness that
embraces dialectic
rhythms. The
fluctuations of these
opposing forces
are preferred over
stability.
CAS are composed
of elements that
can evolve with
environmental
changes.
CAS do not direct
change centrally; the
agents participate
in direction of
change and resultant
outcomes.
System catalysts
that promote the
emergence of new
behaviors.
Correspondence
to Nursing Theories
Rogers’ principle of resonancy
asserts that human patterning
evolves toward more diverse
manifestations evident in opposing
rhythms that evolve toward a unity
(dialectic synthesis); for example,
the pattern of sleeping, waking, and
beyond waking.
Newman asserts that the concept of
health encompasses both disease
and nondisease.
Davidson states that chaotic patterns
give rise to ordered patterns in
human life.
In Parse’s humanbecoming school of
thought, the paradoxical rhythms of
revealing–concealing, connecting–
separating, and enabling–limiting
describe the patterns of relating. The
paradoxical rhythms reflect the whole.
In their theory, Turkel and Ray focus
on the paradox of economics and
caring and its resolution in relational
complexity.
Roy’s theory of adaptive system states
that there are internal processes that
act to maintain the integrity of the
individual or group.
Rogers’ principle of helicy states that
the nature and direction of change are
a function of knowing participation in
the human–environment process.
Ray identifies caring as an attractor
that moves the system toward order
in chaos.
This table was constructed from a synthesis of Lindberg, C. (2008). Nurses take note: A primer
on complexity science. In C. Lindberg, S. Nash, & C. Lindberg (Eds.), On the edge: Nursing in
the age of complexity. Bordentown, NJ: Plexus Press.
Chaffee, M., & McNeil, M. (2007). A model of nursing as a complex adaptive system. Nursing
Outlook, 55(5), 232–241e. DOI: 10.1016/J. outlook; 2007.04.003