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Scand J Work Environ Health 2001;27(1):63-69
Issue date: Feb 2001
doi:10.5271/sjweh.588
Consequences of workplace bullying with respect to the
well-being of its targets and the observers of bullying
by Vartia MA-L
Affiliation: Finnish Institute of Occupational Health, Department of
Psychology, Laajaniityntie 1, FIN-01620 Vantaa, F..a@occuphealth.fi
The following articles refer to this text: 2011;37(3):204-212;
2011;37(4):276-287; 2016;42(1):26-33
Key terms: observer; psychological work environment; stress
reaction; well-being; workplace bullying
This article in PubMed: www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11266149
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Print ISSN: 0355-3140 Electronic ISSN: 1795-990XScand J Work Environ Health 2001, vol 27, no 1
63
Vartia
Scand J Work Environ Health 2001;27(1):63—69
Consequences of workplace bullying with respect to the well-being of its
targets and the observers of bullying
by Maarit A-L Vartia, MA
Vartia MA-L. Consequences of workplace bullying with respect to the well-being of its targets and the observers
of bullying. Scand J Work Environ Health 2001;27(1):63—69.
Objectives This study investigated the effects of workplace bullying and the psychological work environment
on the well-being and subjective stress of the targets and observers of bullying.
Methods In a questionnaire study, stress and psychological ill-health were measured, and the causes of reported
stress were analyzed for municipal employees (N=949, 85% women, 15% men, mean age 41 years for the men
and 40 years for the women).
Results Both the targets of bullying and the observers reported more general stress and mental stress reactions
than did respondents from the workplaces with no bullying. The targets also expressed feelings of low self
confidence more often than did those who had not been subjected to bullying. Being bullied, but also features of
one’s work, especially haste, excessively difficult tasks and poor goal clarity, predicted the stress reactions
reported. Of the single forms of bullying, judging a person’s work unjustly or in an offending manner, restricting
a person’s possibilities to express his or her opinions, and assaulting one’s private life were the most clearly
connected with all the stress reactions measured. Victim history was associated with feelings of low self
confidence. The targets of bullying used sleep-inducing drugs and sedatives more often than did the respondents
who were not bullied.
Conclusions The study shows that not only the targets of bullying, but also bystanders, suffer when someone is
bullied in the workplace. Bullying must therefore be regarded as a problem for the entire work unit and not
merely as a problem of the target.
Key terms psychological work environment, stress reactions, targets of bullying.
1
Finnish Institute of Occupational Health, Department of Psychology, Helsinki, Finland.
Reprint requests to: Ms Maarit Vartia, Finnish Institute of Occupational Health, Department of Psychology, Laajaniityntie 1,
FIN-01620 Vantaa, Finland. [E-mail: m..a@occuphealth.fi]
Being bullied at work can be classified as a significant
source of social stress at work (1, 2). Bullying or mob
bing (1, 3) refer to situations in which someone is sub
jected to long-lasting, recurrent, and serious negative or
hostile acts and behavior that are annoying and oppress
ing. In the bullying process targets become unable to
defend themselves. Examples of the forms of single neg
ative acts of bullying are negatively gesturing toward
or glancing at the target, ignoring the target, refusing to
talk or listen to the target, slander, laughter and scorn
directed toward the target, and belittling of the target’s
work.
Many authors have reported a significant associa
tion between exposure to workplace bullying and health
and well-being. Increased levels of psychological com
plaints, depression, burnout, anxiety, and aggression,
and also psychosomatic and musculoskeletal health
complaints have been reported in various studies (1, 2,
4—7). Among Norwegian blue-collar and white-collar
workers, bullying alone accounted for 13% of the vari
ance in psychological complaints, 6% of the variance
in musculoskeletal problems, and 8% of the variance
in psychosomatic health complaints (5). Symptoms of
post-traumatic stress disorder and general anxiety dis
order have been identified among interviewed victims
of bullying and among patients subjected to bullying (4,
8, 9). Of the different forms of bullying, an attack on
the person’s privacy or personal derogation has shown
the strongest and most consistent correlation to psycho
logical ill-health (1, 5). Bullying has also been report
ed to be associated with sick leave (6, 10, 11). Suicidal
thoughts and suicides have been reported by some writ
ers as the most extreme consequences of bullying (8,
12, 13).64
Scand J Work Environ Health 2001, vol 27, no 1
Health consequences of workplace bullying
In regard to the consequences of bullying, some
studies have explored the significance of the duration
and frequency of the negative acts (5, 6). In a study
among labor union members (5), the duration of bully
ing correlated significantly with psychological, psycho
somatic, and musculoskeletal symptoms. In the public
sector, those who had been bullied every day or almost
every day for 6 months to 2 years were the persons who
most often reported feelings of depression (14). It has
also been shown that the negative health effects of bul
lying do not disappear immediately when the negative
behavior has stopped or when the person has changed
jobs (15).
Workplace bullying can be seen as a process com
prising several phases, from aggressive behavior to the
victim’s exclusion from the workplace and severe trau
ma (3, 16). In this process, all members of the work unit
have some role, often the role of observer or onlooker.
In studies on bullying at schools, the roles of classmates
have been discussed (17, 18), but in workplace bully
ing the roles of the members of the work unit and the
effects that bullying have on their health have thus far
received very little attention. In a nationwide interview
study (15), the observers of bullying reported more
health symptoms than those working in workplaces in
which no one was bullied; 34% of those who reported
that someone was continuously being bullied at their
workplace had sleeping problems, as opposed to 19%
for those who reported no bullying at their workplace.
The same trend was also seen, for example, for head
ache, strain, fatigue, and lack of energy.
Numerous studies have demonstrated the connec
tions between the features of work, work organization,
cooperation, and the like and stress reactions (19). It has
also been shown that work-related factors (eg, role con
flicts, work control, poor flow of information, and haste
at work) can promote bullying (20, 21). In studies on
the effects of workplace bullying on employees’ health
and well-being, the environmental factors have not,
however, been controlled. The relationship between bul
lying and health has, however, been reported to be mod
erated (eg, by the victim’s self-esteem, social support,
and lack of social anxiety) (5).
The primary aim of this study was to investigate the
subjective stress and reported symptoms of psychologi
cal ill-health among bullied employees and observers of
bullying. The health effects of bullying were studied in
such a way that the contents and organization of work
were also taken into account. Furthermore, the purpose
of the study was to examine what forms of bullying have
the most detrimental effects on the health of the affect
ed persons. One question is whether not a person who
has been a victim of bullying once is more likely to be
come a victim also at some other workplace. No earlier
data on this issue are available. Another objective was
to investigate this “victim history” and the connections
between it and reported stress symptoms. In addition,
the use of sleep-inducing drugs and sedatives by the vic
tims of bullying and absence from work due to bullying
was investigated.
Subjects and methods
The subjects of this study were members of the Federa
tion of Municipal Officials working in a variety of oc
cupations in the municipal sector. Every 35th member
of the union was selected from its membership list. Al
together 1577 questionnaires were distributed, and 1037
persons responded (response rate 65.5%). Eighty-eight
of the returned questionnaires were rejected, however,
because of the respondent’s long-term unemployment or
absence from work. The remaining 949 respondents
formed the study group. Most of the subjects were em
ployed in office work (48%), food services and basic
services (12%), technical occupations, fire fighting, har
bor or traffic (12%), or in social work (10%) — 85%
were women and 15% were men. The mean age of the
men was 41 (SD 10.51) years and that of the women
was 40 (SD 10.09) years.
Measures
The following definition of bullying was provided:
“Bullying is long-lasting, serious negative action and be
havior that is annoying and oppressing. It is not bully
ing if you are scolded once or someone shrugs his or
her shoulders at you once. Negative behavior develops
into bullying when it is continuous and repeated. Often
the target of bullying feels unable to defend him or her
self.” The respondents were then asked if they felt them
selves subjected to such behavior or if they had observed
someone else at their workplace being subjected to this
kind of negative treatment. The various forms of bully
ing were measured using a revised version of the Ley
mann Inventory of Psychological Terrorization (22). The
frequency and duration of negative acts were both as
sessed with one question, also used by Leymann (23).
Stress and psychological health were measured with
the Occupational Stress Questionnaire, developed at the
Finnish Institute of Occupational Health (24, 25). A def
inition of stress was first given and the respondent was
asked if he or she felt this kind of stress. “Stress means
a situation in which a person feels tense, restless, nerv
ous, or anxious, or is unable to sleep at night because
his or her mind is troubled all the time. Do you feel this
kind of stress these days?” This kind of stress is referred
to “general stress” in this paper. The content, construct,
and predictive validity of this single-item measure of
stress from the Occupational Stress Questionnaire haveScand J Work Environ Health 2001, vol 27, no 1
65
Vartia
been investigated with 4 research data sets. The single
question on stress proved to be valid and was feasible
in different measurement contexts at the group level
(26). Psychological stress symptoms and mental re
sources were measured with 14 items, (eg, “Are you de
pressed?”, “Have you been unusually tired lately?”,
“Are you nervous?”, “Do you feel capable and confi
dent?”) The response scales were 5-point Likert scales.
The measures of a psychological work environment
and the characteristics of work (eg, haste at work, work
tasks that are too difficult) were measured with the sin
gle items of the Occupational Stress Questionnaire. Vic
tim history, use of sleep-inducing drugs and sedatives,
and absence from work because of bullying were each
assessed with 1 question.
Statistical analysis
Factor analysis (maximum likelihood) and varimax ro
tation were conducted for the psychological stress symp
toms and mental resources. The symptoms were grouped
into 2 dimensions. The items of these factors were
summed, and 2 symptom scales were formed, one be
ing named “mental stress reactions” and the other be
ing “feelings of low self-confidence” (table 1). Differ
ences in the reported symptoms between the study
groups were analyzed using ANOVA (analysis of vari
ance) and pairwise t-tests. Cronbach’s alpha was com
puted for the factors that showed that the internal con
sistency of both factors was high (α 0.88 and 0.78).
Product-moment correlations (Pearson’s r) between the
variables were computed to examine the strength of the
relations between the single forms of negative acts and
the stress reactions measured. A multiple regression
analysis was carried out to determine the combination
of variables explaining the reported stress and psycho
logical symptoms.
Results
Ten percent (94 respondents) felt themselves bullied,
and 9% (83 respondents) were observers of bullying.
The frequency and duration of negative acts perceived
by the targets of bullying are shown in table 2.
Experienced stress and psychological symptoms
The experienced stress reactions were analyzed for the
following three groups: (i) bullied employees, (ii) ob
servers, (iii) those from workplaces where no one was
bullied, the “nonbullied” group. The general stress lev
el of the targets of bullying was high. Some 40% of the
targets experienced rather or very much stress in com
parison with 25% of the observers and 14% of the non
bullied employees.
The targets of bullying more often reported general
stress, mental stress reactions, and feelings of low self
confidence than the observers and employees from the
workplaces without bullying. The observers of bullying,
the bystanders, reported significantly more general stress
and mental stress reactions than did the employees from
workplaces without bullying. No difference was found
between the observers and the nonbullied group, how
ever, in feelings of low self-confidence (table 3).
Bullying and work environment as predictors of stress
symptoms
To find an answer to the question “How significant is
the effect of bullying and what are the effects of work
conditions in causing the reported stress reactions?”, 2
regression analyses were conducted, one to determine
the meaning of being a target of bullying and the other
to clarify the meaning of observing bullying, in relation
to the reported health outcomes.
Being a target of bullying was a significant predic
tor of all the stress symptoms measured (table 4). The
features of work were also significant explanatory fac
tors. Although only some features of work were meas
ured, 20% to 25% of all the variance of the reported
stress symptoms could be explained. Bullying alone
accounted for 5% of the variance in general stress, 8%
Table 2. Frequency and duration of negative acts, targets of bul
lying (N=93-94).
Percent
Frequency
Daily or almost daily 30
Once a week 16
Less often 54
Duration
<6 months 14
6 months—2 years 28
2—5 years 29
>5 years 30
Table 1. Factor structure of the mental symptoms and resources.
Factor loadings
Factor 1: mental stress reactions
Depressed 0.71
Strained 0.68
Unusually tired 0.68
Nervous 0.67
Distressed 0.63
Staying awake at nights 0.61
Difficulties in falling asleep 0.59
Factor 2: feelings of low self-confidence
Feeling inferior 0.75
Feeling helpless 0.63
Feeling capable and confident -0.57
Feeling lonely 0.5166
Scand J Work Environ Health 2001, vol 27, no 1
Health consequences of workplace bullying
of the variance in mental stress reactions, and 5% of the
variance in low self-confidence. The results also showed
that observing bullying is a significant predictor of gen
eral stress and mental stress reactions (table 4). A re
gression analysis was also conducted with age and gen
der as extra independent variables. Age and gender were
not found to be significant predictors of the stress reac
tions measured.
No clear and parallel relationships were found be
tween the frequency and duration of bullying episodes
and the reported stress reactions.
Forms of bullying and different stress reactions
Some forms of bullying may be more harmful to a tar
get’s well-being than others. “Judging a person’s work
performance wrongly or in an offending manner” was
the form most strongly connected with general stress.
“Assaulting one’s private life” and “judging one’s work
wrongly” showed the strongest correlation with mental
stress reactions. Feelings of low self-confidence were
the most strongly connected with “giving a person
meaningless tasks” and “restricting a person’s possibil
ities to express his or her opinions” (table 5). Targets of
bullying often feel that receiving no tasks or only a very
few puts one in a very unpleasant situation. In this study
“giving a person very few tasks or none at all” was not,
however, significantly associated with any of the stress
reactions measured.
The correlations between different forms of bully
ing were high (table 5). This finding, as well as experi
ences from the victims’ interviews and discussions,
showed that, in most cases, the targets of bullying are
subjected to many forms of bullying at the same time.
Victim history
For most of the targets (79%) this was the 1st case of
being bullied. One out of 5 targets of bullying reported
that they had also been subjected to bullying earlier at
some other workplace, 15% had been bullied once be
fore and 6% more than once. The victim history was as
sociated with feelings of low self-confidence (r=0.24,
P<0.02). Those who had been bullied once or more than
once before more often reported feelings of low self
confidence than those who were being bullied for the
1st time at the time of the study, although no associa
tion existed between victim history and the other stress
reactions measured.
Use of sleep-inducing drugs and sedatives and
absenteeism
The bullied employees used both sleep-inducing drugs
and sedatives more often than the other subjects
Table 3. General stress, mental stress reactions, and feelings of low self-confidence experienced by the bullied, the observers, and the
nonbullied group.
Group General stress Mental stress reactions Feelings of low self-confidence
Mean SD Mean SD Mean SD
Bullied (B) 3.23 1.09 3.00 0.75 2.68 0.81
Observers (O) 2.83 1.12 2.56 0.80 2.31 0.68
Nonbullied (Non) 2.56 1.06 2.33 0.64 2.18 0.61
ANOVA F = 27.75 P<.00001 F = 43.40 P<0.0001 F = 22.62 P<0.0001
Pairwise t-test B/O P=0.0100 B/O P=0.0001 B/O P=0.0005
B/Non P=0.0001 B/Non P=0.0001 B/Non P=0.0001
O/Non P=0.0013 O/Non P=0.0041 O/Non P=0.0945
Table 4. Regression analysis for general stress, mental stress reactions, and feelings of low self-confidence, standardized regression
coefficients.
All Not bullied themselves
General Mental stress Feelings of low General Mental stress Feelings of low
stress reactions self-confidence stress reactions self-confidence
Bullying 0.11*** 0.18*** 0.13*** 0.08* 0.07* 0.03
Haste 0.29*** 0.23*** 0.03 0.28*** 0.22*** 0.05
Goal clarity 0.08** 0.16*** 0.19*** 0.06* 0.13*** 0.19***
Excessively difficult tasks 0.19*** 0.21*** 0.29*** 0.23*** 0.25*** 0.31***
Amount of joint meetings at the workplace 0.11*** 0.13*** 0.12*** 0.13*** 0.16*** 0.14***
Changes at work anticipated 0.13*** 0.04 0.01 0.12*** 0.02 0.02
R2=0.25 R2 =0.26 R2 =0.21 R2=0.23 R2 =0.22 R2 =0.18
R2{adj =0.24 R2{adj=0.25 R2{adj =0.20 R2{adj =0.23 R2 {adj =0.22 R2{adj =0.17
* P<0.05, ** P<0.01, *** P<0.001.Scand J Work Environ Health 2001, vol 27, no 1
67
Vartia
(table 6). The use of these drugs did not correlate with
the duration or the frequency of bullying, nor with the
victim history.
Almost 1 out of 5 (17%) bullying victims reported
that they had been away from work because of bully
ing, 10% had been away several times, and 7% had been
away once.
Discussion
The present study confirmed the results of earlier stud
ies showing that being bullied at work is a threat to the
psychological well-being of bullied employees; the re
spondents who were subjected to bullying experienced
all the measured stress reactions more than the others.
It is important, however, to note that bullying at work
appears to not only have negative effects on the well
being of the victims, but also on the observers of bully
ing, who reported more general stress and mental stress
reactions than those from the workplaces without bul
lying. Bullying was not connected with the level of the
observers' self-confidence.
A central question of this study was how much of
this lowering of mental well-being experienced by the
targets and observers of bullying is actually the result
of bullying and to what extent it is connected with oth
er work environment factors. The study showed that a
significant relationship remained between bullying and
the reported stress symptoms, both among the targets
and among the observers, after the effects of work en
vironment factors had been statistically controlled.
Among the observers, the connection was somewhat
weaker, which is understandable. In addition to
bullying, haste, excessively difficult worktasks, lack of
goal clarity, situations in which there were only a few
or no joint meetings at the workplace, and forthcoming
changes at work were important explanatory variables
of general stress and mental stress reactions. Gender and
age were not connected with any of the stress reactions
measured. We can thus conclude that especially becom
ing a target of bullying, but also observing bullying in
one's work unit, is a significant stress factor related to
health risk.
Different forms of bullying seemed to lead to dif
ferent kinds of subjective symptoms. Earlier Zapf et al
(1) have shown that attacking a person's private life cor
relates the strongest with the psychological ill-health of
a bullied employee. The present study supported this re
sult and showed that also assessing one's work wrong
ly or in an offending manner, assigning meaningless
tasks, restricting one's possibilities to express his or her
opinions, and gossiping behind one's back are associat
ed with mental stress reactions. Assigning meaningless
tasks, restricting one's possibilities to express his or her
opinions, being treated like air, and isolation from oth
ers were the factors most strongly connected with feel
ings of self-confidence. This is an understandable result,
as these forms of bullying in many ways restrict a per
son's possibilities for social contacts in the work unit.
Criticizing one's private life was not, however, associ
ated with the self-confidence of the target.
The frequency and duration of bullying episodes
were not connected with the reported symptoms. This
finding differs from that of Einarsen & Raknes (10), who
found that the duration of bullying was associated with
the reported symptoms. One explanation for this differ
ence may be the small number of victims in the study.
As Leymann (6) also pointed out, another explanation
can be that there were no differences because the stress
level of all the victims was very high.
Some researchers (3) consider that negative treat
ment can be called bullying when such negative acts oc
cur frequently, at least once a week, over a long period
of time (ie, at least 6 months). In this study many
employees felt that they themselves were targets of
bullying although they had been treated negatively for
less than 6 months. They also reported mental stress re
actions more often than those who experienced no
Table 5. Correlations between single forms of bullying or nega
tive acts and stress reactions among the targets of bullying
(N=96).
General Mental stress Feelings of low
stress reactions self-confidence
Treated like air 0.13 0.21* 0.28**
Isolation from others 0.08 0.19 0.27**
Restricting possibilities
to express one's opinions 0.22* 0.21** 0.31***
Giving no or very few tasks -0.03 0.05 -0.06
Giving meaningless tasks 0.14 0.25* 0.43***
Judging one's work wrongly 0.34*** 0.25** 0.21*
Assaulting one's private life 0.29** 0.28** 0.14
Speaking ill behind one's back 0.17 0.24* 0.23*
* P<0.05, ** P<0.01, *** P<0.001.
Table 6. Use of sleep-inducing drugs and sedatives by the tar
gets of bullying, the observers, and those from workplaces with
out bullying.
Bullied Observers Nonbullied
(%) (%) (%)
Sleep-inducing drugs
No 88 90 95
Yes, occasionally or
regularly 13 10 5
Sedatives
No 84 92 97
Yes, occasionally or
egularly 16 8 3
Sleep inducing drugs χ2 = 9.76 P<0.01
Sedatives χ2 = 28.59 P<0.00168
Scand J Work Environ Health 2001, vol 27, no 1
Health consequences of workplace bullying
bullying. Due to the small number of bullying victims,
it was not possible to conduct an analysis that would
take into account both the duration and frequency of bul
lying episodes at the same time.
Almost 80% of the targets reported that they were
being subjected to workplace bullying for the 1st time.
This result supports our experiences from discussions
and interviews with victims of bullying, who most of
ten said that bullying starts unexpectedly and that they
were being subjected to bullying for the 1st time. The
results of the stress reactions and victim history indi
cate that repeated workplace bullying especially affects
feelings of self-confidence negatively. In this study,
however, the group of respondents bullied once or more
than once before was small, and it was therefore diffi
cult to draw any conclusions about the significance of
repeated bullying for well-being. Earlier studies (6, 11)
have shown an association between bullying and sick
leave. In the present study, 18% of the victims of bully
ing reported that they had been away from work once
or several times due to bullying. This is not very much.
Often bullied employees dare not be away from work
because absence from work could become a new rea
son for bullying.
In this study both single-item measures and sum
scales were used in measuring psychological health and
well-being. Although sum scales are generally consid
ered more valid than single-item measures, validity re
search has shown that single-item stress measures can
be valid on the group level. Long-term conclusions
about stress on the individual level cannot be drawn on
the basis of only 1 question (26). As Orhede (27) has
stated, sum scales can also be strongly blurred or biased.
Although many studies on bullying have been con
ducted during the past few years, there is still much to
be done. Comprehensive, systematic study of all the
consequences of workplace bullying, including econom
ic ones, is still needed. We also need more information
about both the environmental and personal factors that
moderate, for example, the negative health effects of
workplace bullying and the different kinds of bullying
processes at workplaces. In practice, we have seen that
some victims of bullying have fallen seriously ill after
6 months of serious bullying, while others are still work
ing even after 5 to 10 years of bullying.
QUESTIONS:
1. Summarize in own words this article but not copying the words of the article.
2. In what way does the articlle support the thesis statement?
Thesis statement:
Being bullied at work can be classified as a significant source of social stress at work, either bullying or mobbing, which refers in which someone is subjected to long-lasting, recurrent, and severe negative or hostile act and behaviour that are annoying and oppressing.
3. Rate this source. Is it an excellent source that supports your thesis statement? A good source? A average source? Explain your answer (use what you have learned from the video you watched about how to evaluate sources using the CRAPP technique.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7HdGORThroo
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