PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to examine the psychosocial factors that predict mentoring among nurses.Design/methodology/approachThis study adopted a survey research design. Questionnaires were used to collect data on self‐esteem, locus of control, emotional intelligence and demographic factors from 480 nurses (males 230; females =250) from five states in southwestern Nigeria. Data analysis included regressing mentoring behaviour on the psychosocial factors.FindingsResults revealed that self‐esteem, locus of control, emotional intelligence, age, job status and tenure are linear predictors mildly associated to mentoring but gender is not.Practical implicationsAn implication of the findings from this study is that counselling and industrial psychologists should let the employees know the importance of mentoring and the factors that predict it among nurses in the workplace. It is suggested that formal mentoring should be introduced into the various work organizations and career counsellors employed to counsel the workers on what they stand to gain from developing mentoring relationships.Originality/valueThis study is able to demonstrate that some psychosocial factors are linear predictors mildly associated with mentoring among nurses in Nigeria. Career counsellors, personal psychologists and nurses will find the results from this study useful when they are considering factors that could predict mentioning relationships among nurses.