Abstract
BACKGROUND: The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic had a great psychological effect on health service providers and students of related fields. The study aimed to investigate the relationship between COVID-19 anxiety and academic identity and the motivation to study nursing and midwifery during the COVID-19 pandemic. MATERIALS AND METHODS: In a cross-sectional study 221 nursing and midwifery students at-University of Medical Sciences in 2020 using census sampling were studied. The questionnaires were GADQ-7, the student's academic identity standard questionnaire, the coronavirus anxiety scale, and academic motivation in nursing and midwifery. Pearson's correlation coefficient, regression coefficient, and path analysis were used in statistical software AMOS (version 21) and SPSS (version 22). RESULTS: The results showed that motivation and anxiety with a significant overall effect of 0.43 and -0.36 were the main determining variables of academic identity respectively (P < 0.001). COVID-19 anxiety was recognized as responsible for 24% of the changes in motivation to study nursing (P < 0.001). CONCLUSIONS: Academic identity and motivation to study nursing and midwifery have been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. The need for psychological attention in this situation is required for nursing and midwifery students.