At the core of the SSTeMM project is the development of a mobile phone application that provides a student nurse with a personal ‘stress signature’ – that is a self-assessment tool in relation to tracking their stress levels over time and access to a website where they can find short lessons and tips on how to manage their personal stress. As part of the development process, the SSTeMM project team facilitated a series of focus groups with student nurses to gain their views on whether they found the application useful and, if so, what features do they think still need to be improved. To organise both the discussion and analysis the SSTeMM team used a technology acceptance model.

Overall, the student nurses felt the mobile application was useful as a new means of improving their own personal awareness of what makes them stressed. They felt this would be useful in terms of improving their interpersonal relationships whilst on placement. Whilst overall, they found the interface easy, they did report that at times it was somewhat difficult to understand how to use it, particularly in relation to measurement of stress. They recommended that future releases should include information on what the measures mean and that the support tips should be accessible through the app (these are explained on the website but resources available did not allow for them to be included within the app).