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The purpose of this paper is to explore to what extent job, organizational, and personal characteristics independently contribute to the prediction of workplace victimization of local government employees in the Netherlands. The existence of interactions between personal and context (job and organizational) characteristics is also explored.

Structured survey data measured the frequency of victimization involving three types of incidents: verbal aggression; threats; and physical violence. Associations with job and personal factors and interaction effects were studied using bivariate and multivariate analyses.

Contact frequency, perceived work stress, and type of job held by local government employees are the strongest correlates of workplace aggression. Self-efficacy in employees’ conflict management skills shows an unexpected positive association with the level of experienced aggression, especially in organizations that have low levels of prevention measures.

Because of the cross-sectional design of the study, no definite causal conclusions can be drawn. Common-method bias in the measurements may have led to systematic bias.

This study presents an integrated model of correlates of public-initiated workplace aggression toward a population that is understudied: namely, local government employees. It also provides first insights into how job, organizational, and personal correlates of workplace victimization interact in this population.

In Dutch detainee care custodial transport police officers experience high levels of aggression and violence from detainees. Being a first of its kind in the Netherlands, the purpose of this paper is to unravel the true nature and origins of such workplace aggression against transport officers and focuses on the role of street-level leadership and leadership by management for its mitigation and prevention.

Unique in such closed institutions as the prison system, the study employs an extensive mixed methods approach, combining observations, interviews and survey data collected among transport officers and detainees in 2012-2013.

The research shows that within the exercised street-level leadership of transport officers especially staff orientation towards detainees has great impact. Perceived inappropriate treatment is likely to increase detainees’ aggressive behaviours, with potentially detrimental effects such as heightened levels of officers’ job stress, decreased safety and decreased quality of detainee transport. The solutions offered indicate that while transport officers could benefit from a supportive staff orientation, transport police management might need to pay more attention to rule enforcement leadership within their efforts to optimize working conditions.

The major practical implication of this research is the potential impact of training in affecting the decisions of frontline public employees in a way that their street-level leadership practices manifest the organizational values and alignment with societal values to ensure an adequate public sector service delivery.

Staff must have an appreciation of legal and ethical issues associated with the people they care for, particularly when physical restraint to manage aggression or violence is being considered. This article examines legal and ethical issues related to the management of aggression and violence, and considers the inclusion of this material in training courses.

This paper aims to investigate the socio-psychological systems in organizations that structurally support workplace aggression.

Using both a structural and contextual model of intimate partner violence (IPV), the factors supporting workplace aggression were analyzed. The narratives were provided from the participants’ lived experiences of workplace aggression, producing clear indications of where formal and informal power reside.

The methods of power and control used by workplace perpetrators parallel those illustrated in IPV. The inaction of management and the lack of social support enabled informal power asymmetries and the organizational norm of silence. The findings have implications for how workplaces view and intervene in relationship-based violence.

Workplace aggression has been studied from a conflict management perspective, without exploring the components that enable and support organizational abuse. As a result, organizational responses to workplace aggression have failed to address the complex relationship-based components and consequences. The primary contribution of this study is the disruption of the conflict-based perspective of workplace aggression into a more appropriate framework of violence, power and control.

The purpose of this paper is to undertake a systematic literature review to appraise the current evidence relating to the factors associated with violence and aggression in adult psychiatric hospital inpatient settings.

A systematic search of following four databases was conducted: Scopus, PsychINFO Medline, CIHAHL and PsychArticle. Following the application of the inclusion criteria, ten papers were extracted and included in the review. A quality appraisal tool, Mixed Methods Appraisal Tool (MMAT) version 2011 (Pluye et al., 2011), was employed for the appraisal of the qualitative and quantitative studies. MMAT has been designed for systematic literature reviews that include qualitative, quantitative and mixed methods studies. Of these, eight were of quantitative methodology and two were of qualitative studies.

These ten papers provide an insight into factors associated with violence and aggression towards nursing staff. Three main themes were identified: the environment, attitudes/interaction of staff, and the patient’s mental illness. The themes were important factors in the causes of violence but were interlinked highlighting the complex nature of violence towards nursing staff. The findings support the need for training for nursing staff and the development of ongoing support and for organisations to consider both the environment and the restrictive procedures to help reduce violence and aggression towards nursing staff.

The paper concludes by outlining the importance of considering the three main themes for clinical practice, training and development of secure services.

This paper gives insight into the factors associated with patient violence and aggression towards nursing staff in a secure setting.

Since the early 1980s, breakaway training has been synonymous with many prevention and management of violence and aggression (PMVA) training programmes in social care and NHS settings. However, for almost three decades, this community has continued to accept a training approach that has been largely unsupported by a robust underpinning methodology or evidence base. The validity of this historical training approach will be examined in context with the available literature, and will seek to identify the fundamental flaws that have been inherent in the traditional system. This paper will conclude by making some practical suggestions on how the efficacy of personal protective training may be improved, based on the emerging findings from other scientific fields.

A conceptual framework for the analysis of aggressive behaviour is described that takes into account both psychological and physiological determinants as well as both personal and situational factors. The system should assist forensic practitioners in making diagnostic and predictive assessments of violent offenders and in formulating individual management and treatment plans.

This article describes the design and implementation of the management of aggression care plans (MOACAP) in a secure service for people with learning disability and severe challenging behaviour. The MOACAP is a five‐part document, which has sections for descriptions of challenging behaviour, escalation patterns of the behaviour, non‐physical interventions, physical interventions and post‐incident briefing.Preliminary evaluations suggest that use of MOACAP leads to a reduction in aggressive incidents in the service. The approach should also be relevant to other forensic, mental health and challenging behaviour services and brain injury units. The MOACAP may also be relevant to services that will be affected by the National Institute for Clinical Excellence (NICE) and the National Institute for Mental Health in England (NIMHE) guidelines on the short‐term management of disturbed (violent) behaviour.

The purpose of this paper is to inform understanding of female offenders who commit domestic violence. This contentious area of research is growing and there are strong indications that men and women perpetrate similar levels of domestic violence. This has resulted in increasing interest in understanding the characteristics of such offenders as well as considering treatment pathways.

In this study, female prisoners (n=92) completed a measure of psychological and physical aggression (Revised Conflict Tactics Scales, Straus et al., 1996) to explore the types of domestic violence experienced and perpetrated in most recent and previous relationships.

Results indicated high levels of psychological aggression and physical assaults both experienced and perpetrated by female offenders in current and previous relationships. Physical assaults tended to be severe and high levels of mutual violence were reported both in most recent and previous relationships.

The findings suggest the importance of service provision and treatment pathways for female domestic violence perpetrators. On the basis of the findings, treatment needs of such offenders are considered and potential treatment pathways are reflected upon.

There are little known publications exploring the prevalence and characteristics of female domestic violence perpetrators in prison. Research has also tended to focus on current relationships as opposed to considering both current and previous relationships. This paper explores these areas and will be of interest to practitioners working with this client group.

The management of violence and aggression is an important aspect of any service in the NHS and has been rightly tackled as a whole organisational approach. De-escalation is one such aspect of the organisation approach relating foremost to the safety of people and as such is a central part of relational security, personal safety and the therapeutic relationship.

The paper explores the evidence and policies around de-escalation.

The paper recommends that a randomised-controlled trial be designed, comparing different de-escalation techniques to establish an evidence base for this routine practice.

The paper is limited to discussing de-escalation as an approach and the policy that directs it, and does not consider individual theories on aggression and management. It makes recommendations for policy, research and practice.

There is a lack of high-quality evidence around de-escalation policy and principles which staff may believe is evidence-based practice because training is often mandatory. This obviously impacts upon the patient experience and aspects of safety. The paper is valuable to practitioners working in secure environments, or with offenders that may require management of violence and aggression.

There are many policies and guidelines from the government and from professional bodies that seems to have tailored off since 2005 (Muralidharan and Fenton, 2006; UKCC, 2002). Forensic staff are constrained by such guidance which is further complicated by debates concerning care/coercion and forensic environments, some of which is alluded to here.