A study of self-actualization and role adaptation was carried out using a sample of baccalaureate degree nurses who were part of an ongoing larger study of collegiate graduate nurses. (Of an original 222 nurses in 37 medical center hospitals in 1967, 195 were tested in 1970 for the study reported; 112 were still in hospital nursing.) Dependent variables were taken from the 12-scale Personal Orientation Inventory (POI) which tests Time Competence/Incompetence, Inner-directed/Other-directed support, and ten subscales considered important for self-actualization: valuing, feeling, self-perception, awareness, and interpersonal sensitivity. Independent variables concerned attitude and behavior roles: professional role conception, bureaucratic role conception, role deprivation, integrative role behavior, job success (high, average, or low), and job status. Six hypotheses were tested. A factor analysis of the POI scales was done to condense and group the dependent variables; the three derived factors were uncorrelated. Using the POI scales of Time Competence (Tc) and Inner-directedness (1) as shorthand indicators of self-actualization, no significant main effects were obtained to discriminate between the independent variables. Interactive effects between nurses holding varying degrees of strength on independent variables were obtained; the effect of varying strengths of adherence to the bureaucratic work system and to the professional code were separately and jointly interactive with job success when the Time Competence aspect of self-actualization was examined and jointly interactive when the Inner-directed scale was used.