Workplace bullying among employees in Germany: prevalence estimates and the role of the perpetrator

Trends in negative interpersonal relationships at work and awareness of occupational safety and health services: a 2014-2019 trend analysis

OBJECTIVE

A good psychosocial climate at work, including positive interpersonal relationships, is a protective factor for health, whereas social conflict imposes a considerable health risk. Occupational safety and health (OSH) services can help create a positive working environment. In the present study, we analyzed trends in the awareness of OSH services and interpersonal relationships and whether these are linked.

METHODS

We used time series data from the Italian Survey on Health and Safety at Work (INSuLa) from 2014 and 2019 (n = 16 000 employees). Negative interpersonal relationships included workplace bullying and lack of workplace support. The availability of OSH services was measured through items inquiring about the awareness of OSH representatives and OSH training. We used Poisson regression in reporting prevalence ratios and provided predicted probabilities and average marginal effects to show trends and differences in interpersonal relationships and OSH availability.

RESULTS

Our findings suggest that negative interpersonal relationships at work increased, whereas awareness about OSH services declined between 2014 and 2019. These trends were particularly strong for young workers, for whom workplace bullying increased by 6.3% and awareness of OSH training declined by 11.7%. We also found that unawareness about OSH services is associated with negative interpersonal relationships at work.

CONCLUSION

The results suggest that low OSH awareness may be an increasing problem, whereas exposure to an adverse social climate at work became more frequent at the same time. Given the role of OSH services in ensuring a positive working climate, it is important to increase workers' awareness about OSH services.

Study of the variation of the 12-month prevalence of exposure to workplace bullying across national French working population subgroups

OBJECTIVES

The studies are lacking on the variation of the prevalence of exposure to workplace bullying according to subgroups of national working populations. The objectives were to assess the 12-month prevalence of bullying in the national French working population, to describe the reported reasons for bullying, and to study its variation according to various employment variables.

METHODS

The study was based on the data of the 2013 national French working conditions survey. The study sample included 25,769 employees aged 15-65 working in the same job within the last 12 months. The 12-month prevalence of bullying was assessed using a 9-item questionnaire. Employment variables included: occupation, economic activity of the company, public/private sector, company size, permanent/temporary work contract, and full/part-time work. The analyses were performed using statistical methods for weighted survey data.

RESULTS

The 12-month prevalence of bullying was 26.7% and 28.7% for men and women, respectively. The most prevalent forms of bullying were criticisms, exclusion, and deprivation of right of expression. The leading reasons for being bullied were related to occupation, age, and gender. The prevalence of bullying was higher among the younger employees, the employees working in medium/large companies (including the public sector), and among employees working full time. Though significant, the variations according to occupations and economic activities of the company were small.

CONCLUSION

Workplace bullying appeared as a widespread phenomenon in France. More attention should be given to young employees and the employees working in medium/large companies. Preventive measures should also target the whole working population comprehensively.

The prevalence and mental health correlates of exposure to offensive behaviours at work in Hungary: results of a national representative survey

BACKGROUND

Within the last decades, a substantial number of reports have established bullying behaviours as a severe risk to the health and safety of workers. However, in Hungary, the severity of this issue remains largely unknown. Therefore, the current study aimed to 1) determine the prevalence of offensive workplace behaviours in the Hungarian working population and 2) examine the relationship between exposure to these offensive behaviours and certain mental health indicators.

METHODS

The cross-sectional analyses of the present study are based on a sample of 13,104 active workers being representative of the Hungarian working population according to gender, age, educational level, and 18 occupational sectors. The mid-length version of the Copenhagen Psychosocial Questionnaire II (COPSOQ II) was used to measure workplace offensive behaviours (bullying, sexual harassment, threats of violence, and physical violence) in the 12 months preceding the survey. Examined mental health correlates included depressive symptomatology (Beck Depression Inventory), functional somatic symptoms (PHQ-15), perceived stress (Perceived Stress Scale), and general well-being (WHO Well-being Index).

RESULTS

Almost half (48.7%) of the sample reported exposure to some form of offensive behaviour; 37.6% of participants reported occasional-, while 11.1% reported weekly or daily exposure. More women than men were exposed to offensive workplace behaviours, and those targeted the most were individuals aged 18-29 and in companies employing 20-49 employees. Top managers reported the lowest amount of bullying, while unskilled labourers reported the most frequent exposure. A moderately strong relationship was discovered between exposure to workplace offensive behaviours and all indicators of mental health.

CONCLUSION

Workplace bullying was revealed to be a significant public health concern according to this large, representative data set from Hungary. Strategies to reduce the occurrence and impact of these behaviours on employee health should be a priority for occupational health and safety interventions.

Investigating Mobbing Syndrome's Incidence in the Working Environment of a Public and a Private Greek Hospital

To investigate the phenomenon of moral harassment (mobbing) as well as the effect of demographic and occupational characteristics of healthcare professionals working in a public provincial general hospital and a private hospital in Athens a cross-sectional survey was designed. The study was conducted from November to December 2021 through the application of the Leymann Inventory of Psychological Terror (LIPT) a widely recognized research tool for the quantitative investigation of ethical harassment in the workplace. 264 fully completed questionnaires were collected out of the 300 that were distributed in both hospitals (response rates: 92% for the public hospital and 83.3% for the private). It was observed that private hospital's employees were morally harassed to a greater extent and for a longer time than the employees of a public hospital. The levels of moral harassment were quite high, indicating the necessity of thorough audit by the management in both hospitals.

Workplace bullying in a South African higher education institution: Academic and support staff experiences

Orientation: Workplace bullying is a common occurrence in organisations worldwide, and higher education institutions are no exception.Research purpose: This study was conducted with the aim of determining the perceptions of workplace bullying amongst academic and support staff at a higher education institution in South Africa and to ascertain how they are affected by selected sociodemographic variables.Motivation for the study: Currently, there are limited published research studies reporting on the prevalence and/or experience of workplace bullying at tertiary education institutions in South Africa.Research approach/design and method: The study used a quantitative-based survey design. The research setting was limited to one higher education institution in South Africa. The target population of the study comprised all academic and support staff of the institution. A web-based standardised questionnaire was used to collect the data.Main findings: The results revealed that the respondents experienced negative behaviours related to exclusion the most, followed by managerial misconduct, humiliation and belittlement and hostility the least.Practical/Managerial implications: Understanding and addressing workplace bullying is critical to counteract this problem in organisations. The longer the phenomenon is left unattended, the worse it will become and the more difficult it will be to combat. Employers can play a pre-emptive role in the prevention of and intervention in workplace bullying.Contribution/value-add: The study sheds light on the experiences of bullying at a South African university and adds to the body of literature on bullying in the tertiary education sector in the national context.

Prevalence and Consequences of Verbal Aggression among Bank Workers: A Survey into an Italian Banking Institution

Robberies and other violent acts by strangers and intruders are common in banks, which can lead to post-traumatic stress disorder in employees. However, the literature indicates that more subtle and less measurable forms of violence, such as psychological violence, can also cause discomfort among employees. The aim of the present work is to investigate the prevalence of verbal aggression and its consequences among 311 Italian bank employees. A self-administered questionnaire was completed by 197 employees. The results showed a high prevalence of verbal aggression in the sample. It is important to investigate and find the causes and effects of verbal aggression in order to understand the phenomenon in this workplace. Cases of verbal aggression need to be prevented and responded to appropriately. In addition, it should be noted that the effects of verbal aggression do not only affect the victim, but also the workplace, as productivity decreases, and the feeling of a safe environment is missing.

Workplace Bullying and Long-Term Sickness Absence-A Five-Year Follow-Up Study of 2476 Employees Aged 31 to 60 Years in Germany

Objectives: The aim was to investigate workplace bullying as a risk factor for five-year occurrence of long-term sickness absence (LTSA) in a representative cohort of employees in Germany. Methods: In the German Study on Mental Health at Work (S-MGA) (n = 2476), episodes of long-term sickness absence (LTSA) between baseline and follow-up were assessed in the follow-up interview. Workplace bullying was measured in the baseline interview using a hybrid approach, which combines the behavioural experience and self-labelling methods. Through binomial regressions, the association of baseline level of workplace bullying with first-episode LTSA during follow-up was estimated, adjusting for baseline age, gender, occupational level, smoking status and physical demands at work. Results: Severe bullying heightened the risk for LTSA by approximately 50% (Rate ratio—RR: 1.48, 95% Confidence interval—CI: 1.05; 2.19), while occasional bullying heightened the risk by 15% (RR: 1.15, CI: 0.85; 1.55). When excluding LTSA events occurring in the first 2 years, the associations between bullying and LTSA increased by approximately one third. Conclusions: Workplace bullying seems to be a risk factor for LTSA even when controlling for occupational level, smoking and physical demands at work and when taking possible reverse causality into account. We suggest to investigate effects of LTSA in more settings, to distinguish between occasional and severe bullying and employ longer follow-up intervals.

Antecedents of Workplace Bullying among Employees in Germany: Five-Year Lagged Effects of Job Demands and Job Resources

Objectives: The aim of the present study was to examine the long-term association of job demands and job resources with self-reported exposure to workplace bullying in a representative sample of employees in Germany. Methods: We analysed a nation-wide representative cohort of employees working in the same workplace with a 5-year follow-up (S-MGA; N = 1637). The study contained self-reported measures of psychosocial working conditions, including work pace, amount of work, influence at work, role clarity and quality of leadership, and workplace bullying, and of organisational factors, including organisational restructuring and layoffs. Results: After controlling for bullying and occupational level at baseline, higher baseline levels of organisational restructuring (OR 1.73; 95% CI 1.10–2.70), work pace (1.30; 95% CI 1.01–1.66), and amount of work (1.55; 95% CI 1.21–1.99), and lower baseline levels of influence at work (0.70; 95% CI 0.55–0.90) and quality of leadership (0.64; 95% CI 0.50–0.82), were associated with an elevated risk of workplace bullying at follow-up. In all, 90% of cases of self-reported workplace bullying could be attributed to these factors. Conclusions: The study suggests that employees reporting higher demands and lower resources, as well as organisational factors such as restructuring, are at a higher long-term risk of being targets of workplace bullying. Interventions aimed at preventing workplace bullying could benefit from a focus on psychosocial working conditions and organisational factors.

Labour market affiliation among non-bullied colleagues at work units with reported bullying

AIM

This study investigates if non-bullied employees in Work units (WUs) where bullying occur, are more prone to leave the WUs than employees in WUs with no bullying, and if the prevalence of workplace bullying had an impact on leaving the WUs. Leaving the workplace was defined by unemployment or change of workplace at follow-up.

METHODS

We had data from 8326 Danish public health invited employees from 302 WUs. Of these 3036 responded to a questionnaire on working conditions and health in 2007. WUs were classified into three categories of WUs: (1) no bullying (0% bullied), (2) moderate prevalence of bullying (< 10% bullied), and (3) high prevalence of bullying (≥ 10% bullied). Bullied respondents were used to classify the WUs and excluded in the analyses.

RESULTS

We found odds ratios (ORs) for unemployment 1 year later of 1.27 [95% CI 0.69-2.37] in WUs with moderate prevalence of bullying and 1.38 [95% CI 0.85-2.23] among employed in WUs with high prevalence of bullying, adjusted for size of WUs, age, sex, and job category. For turnover 1 year later the ORs were 1.27 [95% CI 0.78-2.15] and 1.46 [95% CI 0.99-2.15] in WUs with moderate and high prevalence of bullying, respectively.

CONCLUSION

We did not find that non-bullied employees leave the WUs with moderate and high prevalence of bullying more than employees in WUs with no bullying behaviour 1 year later. Leaving the workplace tended to be higher among employees in WUs with high prevalence of bullying compared to no and moderate bullying.

How Individual Involvement with Digitalized Work and Digitalization at the Workplace Level Impacts Supervisory and Coworker Bullying in German Workplaces

Digitalized work has gained importance across industrialized countries. Simultaneously, research investigating the consequences of digitalized work for workplace relations among employees, supervisors, and coworkers, such as workplace bullying, is largely missing. This study is, to the best of our knowledge, the first to investigate how digitalized work influences supervisory and coworker bullying dependent on individual, job, and workplace characteristics. We use representative linked-employer-employee data from 3612 employees located in 100 large workplaces in Germany across all industrial sectors and apply random effects multilevel linear analyses. Individual involvement in digitalized work is related to less supervisory bullying for all employees, and for lower qualified employees to less coworker bullying. At the workplace level, when digitalization has advanced, supervisory bullying increases for highly qualified employees. Neither the individual nor the workplace effects of digitalization are explained by mediating factors such as job autonomy, routine or machine work, competency, or psychological or physical stress. Competence and job autonomy prevent the occurrence of bullying, while routine work, psychological stress, and physically demanding work are positively related to bullying. All effects are more pronounced for supervisory bullying than for coworker bullying. Individual involvement with digitalized work seems to change relational dynamics within workplaces and to protect employees from bullying. For highly qualified employees, this is probably related to the gathering of key competencies; for lower qualified employees, it might be linked to working with digital devices. In workplaces where digitalization has progressed, digitalized work may disrupt and change the established work processes and relations and increase the necessity for new coordination and, thus, the occurrence of conflicts.

Descriptive study of workplace demand, control and bullying among migrant and Australian-born workers by gender: does workplace support make a difference?

OBJECTIVE

The objective of this study is to examine the relationship between bullying in migrants and Australians and types of workplace Iso-strain, by gender.

DESIGN AND SETTING

Two descriptive cross-sectional surveys of the Australian working population.

PARTICIPANTS

Australian-born workers of Caucasian ancestry (n=1051, participant response rate=87.3%) and workers born in New Zealand (n=566), India (n=633) and the Philippines (n=431) (participant response rate=79.5%).

PRIMARY AND SECONDARY OUTCOMES MEASURES

Using logistic regression, we examined whether self-reported assessment of various forms of bullying in the workplace was associated with Iso-strain (job with high demands and low control and without social support), gender and migrant status.

RESULTS

The prevalence of workplace bullying within the previous year was 14.5%. Sexual harassment, though rare (n=47, 1.8%), was reported by more women than men (83% vs 17%, χ2=19.3, p<0.0001) and more Australia or New Zealand born workers compared to India or the Philippines workers (75.5% vs 25.5%, χ2=4.6, p=0.032). Indian-born women had lower adjusted OR for being bullied and for being intimidated compared to other women. Independent of migrant status, Iso-strain (1), (low support from boss) and Iso-strain (2), (low support from colleagues) predicted being bullied. Women were more likely to be in an Iso-strain (1) job than men (18.7% vs 13.6%, p=0.013) and had twice the risk of being both verbally abused and intimidated compared to men (OR 9 vs OR 5.5, p<0.0001).

CONCLUSION

Workplace bullying was more likely for women than men. There were few differences between workers from different migrant groups. Iso-strain was the strongest predictor of workplace bullying. Workplaces should encourage supportive and collegiate work environments.

Cardiovascular health outcomes of mobbing at work: results of the population-based, five-year follow-up of the Gutenberg health study

Background

The aim of this study was to determine if there is an increased risk of incident cardiovascular disease (CVD) resulting from workplace mobbing measured with two mobbing instruments in the Gutenberg Health Study.

Methods

In this prospective study, we examined working persons younger than 65 years for the presence of mobbing at baseline and at a 5-year follow-up using a single-item and a 5-item instrument. We used multivariate models to investigate the association between mobbing and incident CVD, hypertension, and change in arterial stiffness and further stratified the models by sex.

Results

After adjustment for confounders, mobbed workers appeared to have a higher risk of incident CVD than those not mobbed (single-item HR = 1.28, 95% CI 0.73–2.24; 5-item HR = 1.57, 95% CI 0.96–2.54). With the 5-item instrument, men who reported mobbing had a higher risk of incident CVD (HR = 1.77, 95% CI 1.01–3.09), while no association was observed for women (HR = 1.05, 95% CI 0.38–2.91). There was no difference in risks between men and women with the single-item instrument. No association between mobbing and incident hypertension and arterial stiffness was seen.

Conclusions

Our results show an indication of an increased risk of incident CVD for those mobbed at baseline when using the whole study population. Differences in risks between men and women when using the five-item instrument may be due to the instrument itself. Still, it is essential to detect or prevent workplace mobbing, and if present, to apply an intervention to halt it in order to minimize its adverse effects on CVD.

The Associations Between Workplace Bullying and Physical or Psychological Negative Symptoms: Anxiety and Depression as Mediators

Workplace bullying is a critical issue for its negative consequences on victims' health and well-being. This study aimed at examining the intermediate roles of anxiety and depression, in the relations between workplace bullying as a predictor, and physical and psychological negative symptoms as outcomes. In particular, it was hypothesized that workplace bullying would be associated with higher anxiety and depression and, through them, with higher physical and psychological negative symptoms. We sampled 151 Italian employees, who called on a workplace bullying public clinical center as victims and filled a paper-and-pencil questionnaire. Results of bootstrapped regressions showed that only anxiety mediated the association of workplace bullying with negative physical symptoms while both anxiety and depression mediated its association with negative psychological symptoms. The results have implications for the development of appropriate intervention strategies for both prevention and clinical treatment. In particular, timely diagnosing and treating anxiety and depression could prevent subsequent problems related to psychological and physical symptoms such as colitis, headache, tiredness, nervousness, etc. Organizational interventions in terms of primary prevention are also discussed. From an empirical standpoint, the study contributed to disentangling the differential roles of anxiety and depression with respect to physical and psychological symptoms; moreover, overcoming a common limit of workplace bullying research, the current study was carried out on actual victims.

Workplace bullying and depressive symptoms among employees in Germany: prospective associations regarding severity and the role of the perpetrator

Objectives

The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of self-reported workplace bullying on depressive symptoms in a prospective study among a representative sample of employees from Germany. We focused specifically on the role of the perpetrator (co-workers and superiors), which was never done before in a longitudinal design.

Methods

We used data from a nation-wide representative panel study with a 5-year follow-up (N = 2172). Data on bullying exposure were obtained separately for different perpetrators (co-workers and superiors) and degree of severity (severe bullying, i.e., at least weekly). Depressive symptoms were assessed with the Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ). We used logistic regression analyses to examine the effect of workplace bullying at baseline on depressive symptoms at follow-up.

Results

After adjusting for baseline depressive symptoms, severe bullying by co-workers significantly increased the 5-year risk of depressive symptoms (OR = 2.50). Severe bullying by superiors had a nonsignificant effect.

Conclusions

Workplace bullying is a risk factor for depressive symptoms among employees in Germany. The type of perpetrator seems to be an important factor to consider, as indicated by the elevated risk of depressive symptoms when bullying is perpetrated by co-workers.