Abstract
BACKGROUND: Envy and career plateau are common among nurses. Envy can result from upward social comparisons and negatively affect individuals’ behaviors, emotions, and organizational perceptions. This study aimed to determine the effect of nurses’ personal and professional characteristics and workplace envy levels on perceptions of career plateau. METHODS: This cross-sectional study was conducted using an online survey distributed to nurses working in university, private, and public hospitals in Türkiye. The study’s sample consisted of 431 nurses, and data collection tools included a Nurse Information Form (including demographic and work-related variables), the Career Plateau Survey, and the Benign and Malicious Envy Scale (BeMaS-T). Descriptive statistics, Pearson correlation analysis, and multivariate linear regression analysis (enter) were used to analyze the data. RESULTS: The mean scores of the nurses’ job content career plateau, hierarchical career plateau, BeMaS-T malicious envy, and benign envy scales were 3.24 ± 0.66, 3.39 ± 1.17, 4.19 ± 1.42, and 4.12 ± 1.21, respectively. It was found that the nurses’ marital status influenced the perception of job content (R2 = 0.043, F = 3.784, p = 0.002), and the status of voluntarily choosing the nursing profession, the type of institution, and the perception of malicious envy influenced the perception of hierarchical career plateau (R2 = 0.165, F = 8.290, p > 0.001). CONCLUSIONS: Malicious envy and high levels of perceived career plateau are not desirable situations in hospitals because they have the potential to negatively affect patient care, nurses, and the organization, and effective interventions should be put in place to reduce them. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12912-025-03817-z.