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The risk of potentially avoidable cardiac arrest for patients in general wards is more than five times greater than that for patients in critical care areas (Hodgetts et al., 2002 ). However, studies show a marked lack of awareness of patients at risk for adverse outcomes and of the management of critical patients among staff nurses (Fuhrmann, Lippert, Perner, & Østergaard, 2008 ; Kim & Kim, 2006 ). Hravnak et al. (2008 ) showed that continuous electronic monitoring provided sensitive detection of early cardiorespiratory instability in patients in step-down units. They also reported that cardiorespiratory instability was unnoticed 83% of the time and a medical emergency team was activated in only 17% of cases, indicating suboptimal competence of staff nurses (Hravnak et al., 2008 ). Underpreparedness of nurses responding to an in-hospital resuscitation event may result in an extended time to intervention and consequently a decrease in the patient's chance of survival (Moretti et al., 2007 ). Therefore, special attention and effective training for staff nurses is needed to ensure high-quality resuscitation and patient safety because nurses are often the first responders in clinical emergencies.
Competence includes knowledge, skills, and a series of personal abilities and attributes (Fernandez et al., 2012 ). Effective resuscitation requires competence in both technical and non-technical skills. Technical skills have been defined as the "adequacy of the actions taken from a medical and technical perspective," and nontechnical skills have been defined as "decision-making and team interaction processes used during the team's management of a situation" (Gaba et al., 1998 ). In addition to technical skills, including airway rescue, chest compression, defibrillation, and drug administration, non-technical skills, such as communication, decision making, leadership, task management, and monitoring, must be considered for safe and efficient team performance (Andersen, Jensen, Lippert, Østergaard, & Klausen, 2010 ; Hicks, Bandiera, & Denny, 2008 ; Walker et al., 2011 ). Although non-technical skills have emerged as important human factors to be considered in resuscitation training, few studies have assessed the technical and non-technical skills of nurses simultaneously.
Individual beliefs, attitudes, skills, experience, and knowledge are known to influence nurses' behavior regarding cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR), according to the theories of reasoned action and planned behavior (Dwyer & Mosel...