Search results

The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between witnessing workplace bullying behavior and employee attitudes and intentions to turnover.

A sample of 150 full‐time employees from two mid‐sized indigenous private manufacturing plants from the province of Henan, China were surveyed at a single point in time.

Findings indicate a negative relationship between witnessing workplace bullying and employee satisfaction and commitment. In addition, strain and satisfaction fully mediate the relationship between witnessing workplace bullying and employee intention to turnover.

Given the link between witnessing workplace bullying and employee attitudes, it is important for Chinese managers to ensure that interactions with employees maintain a positive and professional tone.

The paper's findings suggest that it is not necessary for an employee to be the personal victim of bullying behavior, rather an employee need only be an observer of workplace bullying in order to experience increases in physical and emotional strain.

Consequences of workplace bullying include increased stress, poor physical and psychological health and low job satisfaction. Workplace bullying is particularly prevalent in professions that may involve a degree of aggression. Despite this, little information exists about the nature of workplace bullying in a prison context. The current study aims to investigate the presence of workplace bullying at one British prison.

Employees (n=72) were invited to complete the Work Harassment Scale and the Work Stress Symptom Scale.

A standard multiple regression revealed that direct experience of bullying significantly predicted stress. Factor analyses identified four types of bullying experienced and three types of bullying witnessed by prison employees. Subsequent analyses revealed that experiencing one specific bullying behavior (i.e. dismissive of individual and their work) predicted physical, psychological and behavioral symptoms of stress. Witnessing one form of bullying (i.e. dismissive, personal attack and threats) also predicted the physical and psychological symptoms of stress.

The study is reliant on self reported data and employs a relatively small sample.

Dismissive behavior in particular is associated with employee stress. Interventions should prioritise this type of workplace bullying.

Few studies have considered the nature of workplace bullying in a prison context. The current study details the prevalence of bullying amongst prison employees, the extent to which bullying impacts on employee stress, and the components of bullying that may be most harmful.

The study aims to estimate the prevalence of workplace bullying, personal and work-related impacts, reporting practices for bullying, and the reasons for not reporting bullying incidents in the New Zealand pharmacy sector.

An online survey was conducted among registered pharmacists and pharmacist interns in New Zealand from June to August 2020. The questionnaire comprises both close-ended and semi-structured free-text questions. Goldberg’s 12-item General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-12) assessed the respondents’ general psychological health status, and a 22-item Negative Acts Questionnaire-Revised (NAQ-R) was used to estimate bullying prevalence together with the self-rated/self-labeled questions. The qualitative information obtained from the free-text responses was used to support and elaborate on the quantitative results.

The self-labeled prevalence of workplace bullying was 36.9%, with almost 10% reporting it occurring almost daily to several times per week. The 54.7% prevalence based on the NAQ-R assessment compares well with the prevalence of witnessing the incidents (58.5%). Psychological distress symptoms were experienced by 37.1% in pre-COVID and 45.3% during COVID-year 1. Supervisors or direct managers were the commonest perpetrators (32.7%). Only 28.8% of those who experienced bullying had reported the incidents formally.

This study is cross-sectional, and the relationships indicated are bi-directional. The consistency of the results is reassuring, however inferring causality of effect is challenging. Future studies and analyses should focus on this. This study suggests that in the pharmacy environment bullying from the top is reasonably prevalent, is not commonly reported and requires the design and implementation of prevention and management strategies that take into account and mitigate these bullying factors. Professional pharmacy leadership organizations, National Health Authority and Pharmacy regulators could play a significant role in awareness and training to reduce bullying with the development and promotion of strategies to curb it and improve reporting.

This is the first paper to describe the prevalence and impact of workplace bullying, and the practices of reporting bullying incidents in the New Zealand pharmacy sector. Based on empirical evidence, pharmacists represent a small share of total healthcare workforce, yet the overall prevalence of bullying is consistent with professions with much larger numbers such as medicine and nursing.

This paper seeks to describe bystander behaviour including bystander decisions, actions and outcomes, in the context of workplace bullying.

The paper draws on a study rooted in van Manen's hermeneutic phenomenology conducted with agents who witnessed workplace bullying in international‐facing call centres in Mumbai and Bangalore, India. Conversational interviews and sententious and selective thematic analyses were undertaken to explore participants' lived experiences.

Participants' experiences were captured by the core theme of “helpless helpfulness” which subsumes the major themes of “the primacy of friendship” and “the ascendance of the self”. Friendship prompted participants to completely protect targets and to fully resolve the bullying situation. Yet, participants, whose initial behaviour was in the desired direction, greatly curbed their efforts in response to supervisory reactions and organizational positions. Inclusivist and exclusivist HR strategies adopted by the employer organization constrained participants in their endeavours to support targets.

The study achieves theoretical generalisability but further research is needed to establish statistical generalisability.

Bystander intervention is an important solution to workplace bullying. The study findings help in developing more effective bystander intervention training programmes, apart from advocating the engagement of HRM as a truly unitarist ideology, the development of effective employee redressal mechanisms and the relevance of pluralist approaches and collectivisation endeavours.

Bystander behaviour in the context of workplace bullying has received limited empirical attention. The study breaks new ground in uncovering the contribution of workplace friendship and organizational inclusivist and exclusivist HR strategies to bystander experiences. Further, workplace bullying remains largely unexplored in India.

Researchers have conducted numerous studies on workplace bullying (Björkqvist, Österman, & Hjelt-Bäck, 1994; Branch, Ramsay, & Barker, 2013; Cowan, 2012; Duffy & Sperry, 2007; Fritz, 2014; Harvey, et al., 2006; Liefooghe, 2010; Matthiesen & Einarsen, 2007; Yamada, 2000; Zabrodska & Kveton, 2013). Other studies specifically examined the corporate sector, European trends, and the impact on health and wellness for staff facing workplace bullying (Constanti & Gibbs, 2004; Djurkovic, McCormack, & Casimir, 2008; Query & Hanely, 2010; Thomas, 2005); yet, few studies considered the impact of workplace bullying on American higher education. More specifically, no empirical studies considered the impact of workplace bullying in America’s community colleges. Consequently, Hollis has replicated her study of four-year colleges and universities (2015) and applied the procedures to the community college setting. Consistent with the findings from respondents at four-year colleges and universities (n = 401), this data set revealed that community college respondents (n = 200) proportionally face workplace bullying as well. Sixty-two percent of respondents of four-year colleges and universities reported being affected by workplace bullying, while 64% of community colleges participants reported being affected by workplace bullying. Arguably, the impact on the community college and the first-generation students who pursue a community college education might be more severe as community colleges have fewer resources than four-year colleges and universities to spend on employee disengagement.

Despite an extensive history of research into workplace bullying and the psychosomatic harm associated with it in western contexts, research into the occurrence and manifestation of bullying behavior in the academic workplaces of non-western countries is sparse. In response to this gap, the purpose of this paper is to start a research conversation by reporting an empirical enquiry into the occurrence, forms and perceptions of workplace bullying among academics in Pakistan.

This study was conducted with a representative sample of academics in a large Pakistani province through a cross-sectional survey.

This study reveals that workplace bullying is prevalent among academics in the Pakistani context, with up to half of them regularly exposed to practices such as excessive work monitoring, undermining of professional competence, lack of recognition of work contributions and obstruction of important work-related matters.

The findings underscore the need for developing broader institutional actions, clear policies and grievance procedures to discourage bullying at work in Pakistan. Higher educational managers will find the results useful for development of anti-bullying policies and codes of conduct.

This is the first study to examine the perceptions, occurrence and demographic risk factors associated with workplace bullying among academics in the Pakistani context.

In this paper the authors argue that organizational climate and workplace bullying are connected, intertwined and affect each other. More precisely, the focus of the present study is how a hostile climate at work is related to workplace bullying. A hostile work climate is defined as an affective organizational climate permeated by distrust, suspicion and antagonism. The authors tested four hypotheses about the reciprocal effects and possible gender differences.

The study is based on a longitudinal probability sample of the Swedish workforce (n = 1,095). Controlling for age, the authors used structural equation modelling and cross-lagged structural regression models to assess the reciprocal effects of a hostile work climate on workplace bullying. Gender was added as a moderator to test two of the hypotheses.

The results showed a strong reciprocal effect, meaning there were significant associations between a hostile work climate and subsequent bullying, β = 0.12, p = 0.007, and between baseline bullying and a subsequent hostile work climate, β = 0.15, p = 0.002. The forward association between a hostile work climate and bullying depended on gender, β = −0.23, p < 0.001.

The findings point to a possible vicious circle where a hostile work climate increases the risk of bullying, which in turn risks creating an even more hostile work climate. Furthermore, the findings point to gender differences in bullying, showing that the effect of a hostile work climate on workplace bullying was stronger for men.

This study investigates the association between workplace bullying and intention to leave. The study further attempts to understand the mediating and moderating roles of emotional exhaustion and supervisory support respectively on workplace bullying and intention to leave relationship.

Statistical tools like SPSS and PROCESS Hayes were used for the analysis. Techniques like CFA, regression, moderation mediation analysis were used.

Utilizing conservation of resources (COR) theory and a sample of 480 employees from hospitality sector in India, we found that WPB was positively related to intention to leave. We also found that supervisory support moderated the relationships between emotional exhaustion and intention to leave and emotional exhaustion acted as a mediator between workplace bullying and intention to leave.

First, for the survey self-report questionnaire was employed; hence, it may be biased due to the social desirability effect. However, the researcher has stated that for workplace behavior like an intention to leave and supervisory support, the self-report survey is applicable (Bennett and Robinson, 2000). This study is limited in scope to measure cause-and-effect relationship because it is a cross-sectional study. Therefore, in correlation, the chronological order cannot be established as data were collected at the same time.

First, the result of the study established that workplace bullying can result in high intention to leave which will adversely affect the organization in the long term. Therefore, it is necessary that managers and businesses need to act to reduce workplace bullying. The managers in the organization should facilitate the friendly work environment and implement practices that are detrimental to bullying behaviors.

Since workplace bullying not only affects the target but also the team’s success and organization and the society as a whole, the organization should think of exploring the impact of workplace bullying on team cohesiveness and organizational performance.

This study seeks to explore in more detail the problem of bullying in the hospitality sector in India. The impetus for the study was the growing concern that bullying is creating a lot of turmoil in the life of employees making them either face the situation by being emotionally strong or leave the organization.

This paper aims to explore the phenomenon of workplace bullying in response to recent calls for the development of different approaches and provide an exploration of artful approaches to intervention.

The paper offers a unique conceptualisation of workplace bullying and applies a phenomenological lens to the issue. A review of literature explores the potential value of artful interventions, and drawing on authors’ knowledge and experience with the targets of bullying, they design a forum theatre intervention for use in practice.

This paper argues that phenomenology offers a unique and valuable approach to understanding workplace bullying and its management. In turn, the authors propose that artful ways of engaging with workplace bullying could be an effective way of empowering workers in a “moment” of workplace bullying, and present a forum theatre workshop specifically designed for application in workplace contexts where bullying is prevalent. The three-phase workshop aims to help employees critically reflect on their current work practices and is intended for use in small group teaching.

The long-term impact of this intervention has not been evaluated against more traditional methods of addressing this problem. Future research should evaluate the efficacy of this, and other art-based interventions, in workplace settings.

Workplace bullying research is predominantly conducted from a functionalist perspective, and other methods of inquiry, such as phenomenology, are rarely considered. This paper argues for artful interventions and provides an original, tailored workshop designed to empower employees to recognise and respond to bullying in the workplace.

Workplace bullying has appalling fallouts for organizations and employees. While the association between bullying and employees’ exit intentions has been sufficiently established in research, the underlying conditions remain overlooked. Using the affective events and conservation of resources theories as the theoretical lens, the purpose of this study is to probe work alienation and emotional exhaustion as sequential mediators in the association between bullying and employees’ exit intentions.

A sequential mediation model was examined using three-wave longitudinal data gathered from 406 employees working with hotels situated in tourist destinations of India.

Work alienation serves as a significant mediator between bullying and emotional exhaustion. More importantly, work alienation and emotional exhaustion emerged as sequential mediators in the association between bullying and exit intentions.

Research on workplace bullying is often cross-sectional, and researchers have called for time-lagged and/or longitudinal examination. While responding to the frequent calls made by researchers to examine underlying conditions, this three-wave longitudinal study advocates for holistic cognizance, i.e., how workplace bullying results in employees’ exit.