This research is designed to determine the effect of motivational interview-based communication training on nursing students' counselling skills, communication self-efficacy, and communication reluctance levels. The project will be conducted using a randomised controlled experimental design. The sample will consist of 72 second-year nursing students studying at the Department of Nursing, Ankara University Faculty of Nursing. Participants will be randomly assigned to experimental (n=36) and control (n=36) groups. The experimental group will receive motivational interview-based communication training, while the control group will receive training on basic communication and interpersonal interaction skills in nursing. The training will consist of five sessions; theoretical sessions will be 60 minutes each, and the standard patient interview practice to be applied to the experimental group will last three days. The standard patient interview practices will be conducted in the Communication Skills Laboratory of Ankara University Faculty of Nursing. The research data will be collected using a Demographic Information Form, the Counselling Skills Scale for Nurses, the Effective Communication Self-Efficacy Inventory, and the Communication Reluctance Scale, through pre-test, post-test, and follow-up measurements. Additionally, the project plans to train individuals to assume the role of a standard patient in the communication skills laboratory, creating a standard patient pool that can be used in future training and research. The project expects that motivational interview-based communication training will strengthen nursing students' counselling skills and communication self-efficacy, and reduce communication reluctance. The results are intended to provide a scientific contribution to the planning and development of communication training in nursing education programs.

The study population will consist of 745 nursing students studying at the Department of Nursing, Faculty of Nursing, Ankara University, and the sample will consist of 187 second-year nursing students. Since there was no pilot data, the sample size was determined using the G*Power 3.1 program. According to the power analysis, for a two-group design with three repeated measures, the number of participants was calculated as at least 66, with a type 1 error of 0.05, a power of 0.90, and a moderate effect size (0.25). To prevent possible data loss, the sample size was increased by approximately 10%, bringing the total number of participants to 72. A total of 72 students, 36 in the experimental group and 36 in the control group, will be randomly included in the study. Data Collection Process: In the first stage of the study, in order to create a standard patient pool and to determine the standard patients to be trained in the standard patient application phase of the project, a call for participation will be made to students of the Department of Theatre at the Faculty of Language and History-Geography, Ankara University, through the department, including the participation conditions. Volunteer students who fill out the participation form via Google Forms will attend the training given by the researchers at the Faculty of Nursing to receive standard patient training. In the next phase of the research, students will be invited to participate after being informed about the scope and content of the research. Students interested in participating in the research will be evaluated according to the inclusion criteria, and the contact information of the students who meet the criteria will be collected to form a group. In the next phase, the students in this group will be randomly assigned to groups: 36 students in the experimental group and 36 students in the control group. Students in both the experimental and control groups who agree to participate in the study and fill out the voluntary consent form will be given data collection tools as a pre-test face-to-face. Then, students will be randomly assigned to the experimental and control groups. The experimental group will receive "Motivational Interview-Based Communication Training." The control group will receive "Basic Communication and Interpersonal Interaction Skills in Nursing" training, the content of which is provided in the appendix, face-to-face. The control group's training will consist of a total of five sessions, each lasting 60 minutes. The experimental group's training will consist of four 60-minute theoretical sessions and one practical session involving interviewing a standard patient. The standard patient application session will last three days. For these sessions, a total of six standard patients will be used from the pool created at the beginning of the research: three primary and three reserve patients who wish to participate in the application. The participants will be trained by researchers on the scenarios, and three of them will serve as standard patients in the interview sessions. Standard patient interviews will be conducted in three standard patient interview rooms located in the communication skills laboratory. A total of 18 interviews will be conducted: six in each room in the morning and six in each room in the afternoon. Thus, the interviews of 36 students in the experimental group for one scenario will be completed in one day. After the morning interviews are completed, the recordings of one of the interviews from that session will be reviewed with the participation of the research team and the students who completed their interviews, and analysis sessions will be held based on feedback. The same process will be applied to the second and third scenarios. Immediately after all training sessions are completed, data collection tools will be administered to both groups as a final test, and follow-up measurements will be taken after three months. All stages of the study will be conducted face-to-face. The data collection process will be carried out in coordination with the faculty members to accommodate the students' schedules and not disrupt the coursework.

Inclusion Criteria:

• Being a second-year nursing student
• Volunteering to participate in the research
• Not having communication problems that would prevent answering data collection forms

Exclusion Criteria:

• Having communication problems that would prevent answering data collection forms
• Being a 1st, 3rd or 4th year nursing student

Individual participant data will not be publicly shared due to confidentiality and privacy considerations. Data will be available from the corresponding investigator upon reasonable request.