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This study aims to investigate whether emergency health-care workers distinguish between different categories of perpetrators of violence and how they respond to different types of perpetrator profiles.

Five focus groups with emergency health-care workers were held in Canada. The participants were asked whether they identified different groups of perpetrators of violence and how that impacted their approach. The focus group responses were transcribed verbatim and analysed thematically using a phenomenological approach.

Participants consistently identified five groups of perpetrators and tailored their approach on their assessment of the type of perpetrator involved. The five categories are: violence or aggressive behaviour from family members or bystander and violence related to; underlying mental health/illness issues; underlying physical health issues; addiction and substance use; and repeat visitors/offenders. Violence with an underlying (mental) health cause was handled professionally and compassionately by the health-care workers, while less patience and understanding was afforded in those instances where violence was associated with (recreational) alcohol or illicit substance use.

Emergency health-care workers can consistently distinguish between types of perpetrators of violence and aggression, which they then use as one factor in the clinical and situational assessments that inform their overall approach to the management incidents. This conclusion supports the need to move the focus away from the worker to the perpetrator and to an organisational rather than individual approach to help minimise violence against emergency health-care workers.

This paper aims to determine the impact of perceived virtuality on team dynamics and outcomes by adopting the Input-Mediators-Outcome (IMO) framework. Further, it also investigates the mediating role of team processes and emergent states.

The authors collected survey data from 315 individuals working in virtual teams (VTs) in the information technology sector in India using both offline and online questionnaires. They performed the analysis using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM).

The authors investigated two sets of hypotheses – both direct and indirect (or mediation interactions). Results show that psychological empowerment and conflict management are significant in managing VTs. Also, perceived virtuality impacts team outcomes, i.e. perceived team performance, team satisfaction and subjective well-being.

The interplay between the behavioural team process (conflict management) and the emergent state (psychological empowerment) was examined. The study also helps broaden our understanding of the various psychological variables associated with teamwork in the context of VTs.

Findings from this study will aid in assessing the consequences of virtual teamwork at both individual and organisational levels, such as guiding the design and sustainability of VT arrangements, achieving higher productivity in VTs, and designing effective and interactive solutions in the virtual space.

The study examined the interplay between behavioural team processes (such as conflict management) and emergent states (such as psychological empowerment). The study also theorises and empirically tests the relationships between perceived virtuality and team outcomes (i.e. both affective and effectiveness). It may serve as a guide to understanding team dynamics in VTs better.

This exploratory study attempts to enhance the current understanding of the research and practice of VTs within a developing economy.