Health-promoting behaviors help prevent chronic illness. Health-promoting behaviors of nursing students can affect not only their own health, but also the health of their future patients, for whom they can act as role models. Nursing students should participate in health-promoting behaviors; however, nursing students often have unhealthy behaviors. This study aimed to investigate the factors affecting health-promoting behaviors in nursing students. A descriptive, self-report survey of 304 nursing students from three universities in South Korea was conducted. Subjects' general characteristics, health perceptions, health concerns, and health-promoting behaviors were collected. Of the total participants, 90.1% were female and the mean age was 20.4 years. The mean score for health-promoting behaviors was 2.47, higher than the midpoint. The mean for the subscale of physical activity among health-promoting behaviors was the lowest. The main factors affecting health-promoting behaviors were gender, health perceptions, health concern, and time per week spent searching online for health-related information. The main factors affecting physical activity were gender, health concern, and time per week spent searching online for health-related information. Based on the study findings, it is recommended that a program to empower nursing students to perform health-promoting behaviors be incorporated into the nursing education curriculum with regard to unique needs based on gender. Specifically, it would be effective to develop programs that are easily accessible via the Internet.
Keywords: health concern; health perceptions; health-promoting behaviors; nursing education; nursing students.