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Nursing staff display symptoms of psychological stress more frequently than members of other professions. The subjective experience of embitterment also takes on a greater significance. This paper seeks to determine if level of education has an impact on the degree of embitterment as a function of educational status.

A between subjects design was used with academic status as the independent variable and self‐report embitterment, using the German version of the Bern Embitterment Inventory, as the primary dependent variable. A random sample of 212 German nurses with academic and non‐academic education participated in the study.

The comparison between academic and non‐academic nursing staff revealed a statistically significant difference indicating that an academic education has a positive effect on the subjective perception of embitterment (p=0.001).

Considering the current situation of academic nurses within the German health care system and the everyday nursing routine, psychological stress potential of unique dimensions such as embitterment have important ramifications in terms of understanding the relationship between the mental health and academic status of nurses within this system. The findings suggest the merit and value of further implementation of academic nursing study courses in Germany.