Table 1.

Variables included in the questionnaire

Variables and measure methods
∎ Individual-related factors
- Age, gender, marital status, education level, job title, professional title, working experience lengths of geriatric nursing - Attitudes toward caring for older adults (evaluated by a single-item Likert-type scale, with − 5 indicating that participants feel negatively toward caring for older adults, 0 indicating that participants neither feel negatively nor passionately toward caring for older adults, and 5 indicating that participants feel passionately toward caring for older adults)
∎ Employer-related factors
- Hospital level, department, whether the department had exact job responsibilities for gerontological nurse specialists, and whether the gerontological nurse specialist certificate was associated with a priority for promotion or increase in salary - The degree of satisfaction toward the attention and support, learning opportunities, promotion rules, and position salary or allowance provided by the hospital or department (evaluated by a single-item Likert-type scale, with 1 indicating completely unsatisfied and 5 indicating completely satisfied)
∎ Training-related factors - Location of the gerontological nurse specialist training organizations, the degree to which the training content met clinical needs (evaluated by a single-item Likert-type scale, with 1 indicating completely unsatisfied and 5 indicating completely satisfied), and whether they participated in continuing education training related to geriatric nursing after obtaining the gerontological nurse specialist certificate.