New Findings on the Link between Workplace Bullying and Mental Health

Dear Colleagues,

This Special Issue aims to deepen our understanding of workplace bullying and mental health/well-being regarding all potential stakeholders, i.e., the target of the negative acts but also (organizational) observers, family members of the target, and even the perpetrator(s). There is a meta-analytically well-established link between exposure to workplace bullying and detrimental mental health and well-being (Mikkelsen et al., 2020; Nielsen and Einarsen, 2012; Verkuil et al., 2015). However, important aspects of the relationship between workplace bullying and mental health/well-being have received only scant attention thus far, or remain inconclusive. Therefore, we seek contributions to this Special Issue that primarily address the following topics:

• Regarding theoretical considerations, workplace bullying research has yet to yield a global overarching theory to explain the relationship between workplace bullying and mental health/well-being. Instead, workplace bullying researchers often refer to specific theories from different contexts (e.g., a transactional stress model, cognitive activation theory of stress; Mikkelsen et al., 2020) without testing the implications of these theories, leading to a fragmented theoretical landscape. Moreover, different theories/concepts might have different value in explaining the link between workplace bullying and mental health/well-being outcomes (e.g., Sischka et al., 2021). Therefore, to advance in this area, future studies should employ competitive theoretical tests (Leavitt et al., 2010) to determine weak theories and should develop new theoretical models that integrate the specific characteristics of workplace bullying (Nielsen and Einarsen, 2018; Gupta et al., 2020).
• It has been proposed that the specific circumstances in which workplace bullying takes place (e.g., the number of perpetrators, gender of perpetrator(s), number of observers) play a crucial role for the victim’s appraisal and well-being outcomes (e.g., Samnani, 2013; Zapf et al., 2020). However, very few empirical studies have investigated the influence (or moderation effect) of these micro-contextual characteristics (Nishina and Bellmore, 2010) on the relationship between workplace bullying and mental health/well-being.
• Whereas the effect of workplace bullying on the mental health/well-being of the victim is well established, far less research investigated the effect on the mental health/well-being of other persons involved in the bullying process (e.g., an organizational observer, perpetrator, family members; Boudrias et al., 2021; Vranjes and Lyubykh, 2021). For instance, as workplace bullying represents a serious social stressor, one might hypothesize that it also affects the victim’s family member through different spillover mechanisms (Westman, 2001).
• Although methodological designs have significantly improved over the last 10 years, the relationship between workplace bullying and mental health/well-being is still mainly investigated with cross-sectional questionnaire studies. However, future studies might also implement a vignette design (Aguinis and Bradley, 2014), the critical incident technique (Butterfield, 2005), or experience sampling methods/ecological momentary assessment (Fisher and To, 2012) to gain additional insights into the relationship between workplace bullying and mental health/well-being. Finally, more longitudinal studies are needed in order to inform research and practice, to determine at which point the effects of workplace bullying become long-lasting, and to identify the potential mechanisms. Moreover, longitudinal studies investigating mediators between workplace bullying and mental health/well-being are very rare (Boudrias et all., 2021). This is unfortunate, as cross-sectional analyses can lead to substantial bias if the mediational effects unfold over time (i.e., the data-generating mechanisms comes from an autoregressive model; Maxwell et al., 2011).

Empirical studies, theoretical papers, systematic reviews, and meta-analyses that tackle these issues are welcome.

References

Aguinis, H., and Bradley, K. J. (2014). Best practice recommendations for designing and implementing experimental vignette methodology studies. Organizational Research Methods, 17(4), 351–371. https://doi.org/10.1177/1094428114547952

Boudrias, V., Trépanier, S. G., and Salin, D. (2021). A systematic review of research on the longitudinal consequences of workplace bullying and the mechanisms involved. Aggression and Violent Behavior, 56, 101508. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.avb.2020.101508

Butterfield, L. D., Borgen, W. A., Amundson, N. E., and Maglio, A. S. T. (2005). Fifty years of the critical incident technique: 1954-2004 and beyond. Qualitative Research, 5(4), 475–497. https://doi.org/10.1177/1468794105056924

Fisher, C. D., and To, M. L. (2012). Using experience sampling methodology in organizational behavior. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 33(7), 865–877. https://doi.org/10.1002/job.1803

Gupta, P., Gupta, U., and Wadhwa, S. (2020). Known and Unknown Aspects of Workplace Bullying: A Systematic Review of Recent Literature and Future Research Agenda. Human Resource Development Review, 19(3), 263–308. https://doi.org/10.1177/1534484320936812

Leavitt, K., Mitchell, T. R., and Peterson, J. (2010). Theory pruning: Strategies to reduce our dense theoretical landscape. Organizational Research Methods, 13(4), 644–667. https://doi.org/10.1177/1094428109345156

Maxwell, S. E., Cole, D. A., and Mitchell, M. A. (2011). Bias in cross-sectional analyses of longitudinal mediation: Partial and complete mediation under an autoregressive model. Multivariate Behavioral Research, 46(5), 816–841. https://doi.org/10.1080/00273171.2011.606716

Mikkelsen, E. G., Hansen, Å. M., Persson, R., Byrgesen, M. F., and Hogh, A. (2020). Individual consequences of being exposed to workplace bullying. In S. Einarsen, H. Hoel, D. Zapf, C. L. Cooper (Eds.), Bullying and Harassment in the Workplace (pp. 163–208). CRC Press.

Nielsen, M. B., and Einarsen, S. (2012). Outcomes of exposure to workplace bullying: A meta-analytic review. Work and Stress, 26(4), 309–332. https://doi.org/10.1080/02678373.2012.734709

Nielsen, M. B., and Einarsen, S. V. (2018). What we know, what we do not know, and what we should and could have known about workplace bullying: An overview of the literature and agenda for future research. Aggression and Violent Behavior, 42, 71–83. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.avb.2018.06.007

Nishina, A., and Bellmore, A. (2010). When might peer aggression, victimization, and conflict have its largest impact? Microcontextual considerations. The Journal of Early Adolescence, 30(1), 5–26. https://doi.org/10.1177/0272431609350928

Samnani, A. K. (2013). “Is this bullying?” Understanding target and witness reactions. Journal of Managerial Psychology, 28(3), 290–305. https://doi.org/10.1108/02683941311321196

Sischka, P. E., Melzer, A., Schmidt, A. F., and Steffgen, G. (2021). Psychological contract violation or basic need frustration? Psychological mechanisms behind the effects of workplace bullying. Frontiers in Psychology, 12, 627968. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.627968

Verkuil, B., Atasayi, S., and Molendijk, M. L. (2015). Workplace bullying and mental health: a meta-analysis on cross-sectional and longitudinal data. PloS one, 10(8), e0135225. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0135225

Vranjes, I., and Lyubykh, Z. (2021). Workplace mistreatment: A review and agenda for research. Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Business and Management. https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190224851.013.119

Westman, M. (2001). Stress and strain crossover. Human Relations, 54(6), 717–751. https://doi.org/10.1177/0018726701546002

Zapf, D., Escartín, J., Scheppa-Lahyani, M., Einarsen, S. V., Hoel, H., Vartia, M. (2020). Individual consequences of being exposed to workplace bullying. In S. Einarsen, H. Hoel, D. Zapf, C. L. Cooper (Eds.), Bullying and Harassment in the Workplace (pp. 105–162). CRC Press.

Prof. Dr. Georges Steffgen
Dr. Philipp E. Sischka
Guest Editors

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• workplace bullying
• mental health
• theoretical models
• micro-contextual characteristics