Cyberbullying in the workplace: factors influencing perceptions and implications for the development of an intervention
Year: 2022
Type: dissertation
Abstract: Computer-mediated communication (CMC) is a key ingredient of the modern workplace. Its task-oriented nature permits negative, critical, or aggressive messages to reach colleagues outside the working hours or at times when they may be most vulnerable. The nature of digital communication means allows messages to be copied broadly to peers and senior staff, be visited permanently, or soften the critical comments due to the lack of nuance in verbal communication. This dark side of CMC, which has been recognised as cyberbullying, is starting to receive a lot of attention. The severe consequences of the individual and organisational aspects of cyberbullying have been confirmed in empirical studies. Given a brief history, the potential influencing factors and effective interventions for cyberbullying remain unexplored. This project aims to explore the perceptions of workplace cyberbullying, to develop and establish a preliminary measure of perceptions of cyberbullying, to determine the influence of gender and culture on perceptions and motivations, to explore the experience of workplace cyberbullying in a university setting and to evaluate potential effective interventions for preventing and reducing cyberbullying in the workplace. Chapter 1 provides an up-to-date review of the workplace cyberbullying literature and compares and contrasts it with traditional bullying in the workplace. The review highlighted the differences between traditional bullying and cyberbullying in terms of definitions and impacts. The need for a measure of perceptions was emphasised. The effect of gender on people’s perceptions of workplace cyberbullying has been highlighted. Evidence also showed that the influence of victimisation experiences in workplace cyberbullying remains unclear. In addition, the literature addressed the explanations of workplace cyberbullying engagement in both individual and organisational aspects. Finally, the review highlighted the urgency of developing effective preventions and interventions for workplace cyberbullying. Chapter 2 consists of the first study that aimed to explore the perceptions of cyberbullying in the workplace using a semantic differential method. An additional aim was to develop a practical measurement to assess the perceptions of cyberbullying in the workplace. A total of 76 university students were recruited. The exploratory factor analysis resulted in a 5-item scale which was labelled as the Perceptions of Cyberbullying Scale, capturing people’s appraisal of cyberbullying on five elements including ‘intention to harm’, ‘serious action’, ‘psychological harm’, ‘difficulty to avoid’ and ‘difficulty to prevent’. Chapter 3 consists of the second study that investigated victims’ perceptions of workplace cyberbullying perpetration using the scale developed in the first study. Also, this study investigated the perceived motivations for cyberbullying using a vignette of cyberbullying behaviours. A quasi-experimental method was used to explore the impact of perpetrator and victim’s gender on perceptions, as well as the perpetrator’s motivations in the UK and China. A total of 262 faculty members were recruited. Results showed that people perceived workplace cyberbullying with a male perpetrator as being more intentional to harm, more serious, more psychologically harmful and more difficult to avoid and prevent than if the perpetrator was a female; this significant difference was mainly accounted for by the responses from UK campus. Moreover, female victims were more likely to blame themselves and to endorse exonerated motivations for the perpetrator. This significant difference was mainly accounted for by the responses from China campus. Previous victimisation experiences did not impact the perceptions of workplace cyberbullying. Chapter 4 consists of the third study which was a qualitative analysis of written responses to an online interview. This study aimed to explore the real-life victimisation experiences of cyberbullying in the workplace. Responses from 23 faculty members were analysed using a thematic analysis method. Five themes emerged from the transcripts. Results emphasised that significant negative impacts of workplace cyberbullying were perceived by the victims. Results also showed that when dealing with workplace cyberbullying, problem-focused strategies were favoured over emotion-focused strategies by the victims. Dissatisfaction in organisational support was highlighted by the victims. Chapter 5 consists of the final study which was a systematic review. The initial aim was to assess the effectiveness of interventions designed to prevent or reduce cyberbullying in the workplace. A preliminary scoping exercise showed that there was insufficient evidence of workplace cyberbullying. Thus, the aim was widened to conduct a systematic review of generic interventions for workplace bullying. A search was conducted systematically in Embase, PubMed, PsycINFO, the Cochrane Library, CINAHL and ASSIA for randomised controlled trials (RCTs) published between Jan 2015 and May 2020. The primary outcomes were the number of occurrences, frequencies, and perceptions of severity of workplace bullying. The secondary outcomes included the attitude towards workplace bullying, confidence in dealing with workplace bullying, and any stresses as a result of workplace bullying. Out of 2734 records identified, 7 studies met the inclusion criteria with 1097 individuals. All included studies measured the effectiveness of interventions at the individual-level. The results showed that the behavioural intervention (yoga practice) significantly reduced workplace aggression after treatment compared with the control group (mean difference (MD) -4.44; 95% confidence interval (CI) -7.50 to -1.38). In addition, the early psychological intervention, i.e., Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing, was associated with a significant lower post-traumatic stress disorder score than the control group at the 48-hour (MD -17.49; 95% CI -19.62 to -15.36) and 3-month (MD -21.20; 95% CI -23.98 to -18.42) follow-up. Mixed results were observed in the cognitive behavioural interventions compared to the control group. No significant effects were found in the educational/informational interventions. The review revealed a need for higher quality research in this area with longer follow-up periods, and for evaluations of interventions at the organisational-level that aimed to address and manage bullying in the workplace. The potential applicability of results in workplace cyberbullying was discussed. Future implementations and recommendations for countering workplace cyberbullying are discussed in the final Chapter. Findings from the qualitative study emphasised that there may be a deficit of organisational support for people who have been involved in workplace cyberbullying. This highlighted an urgent need for effective cyberbullying interventions. Moreover, findings from the qualitative study and systematic review suggested a need to develop and evaluate the organisational-level interventions for workplace cyberbullying. Several practical suggestions for developing an effective organisational-level intervention are discussed based on the results from the studies. First, the similar perception ratings suggested that workplace cyberbullying may be recognised as an extension of traditional bullying but with some unique features of its own. The reported workplace cyberbullying perceptions suggested organisations may need an agreed definition of cyberbullying in policies to inform employees with the boundary of unacceptable online behaviours. Secondly, rather than policies, various forms of preventions could be implemented to increase the staff awareness of workplace cyberbullying, such as an induction for employees that particularly emphasises a zero-tolerance of cyberbullying. Thirdly, findings indicated that victims were more likely to engage in the problem-focused strategies. This suggested that more proactive interventions, such as training and resources, might need to be implemented in organisations to help victims to act appropriately in response to cyberbullying. The reported dissatisfaction in the response from organisations and managers suggested a need for training and resources at the managerial level to better respond to the victim. Moreover, findings from the second study suggested that the gender differences might need to be taken seriously when developing interventions as the victims’ perceptions of cyberbullying may vary regarding their gender and the perpetrators’ gender. The multi-national organisations might need to take the cross-country effect into account based on the diverse perceptions of workplace cyberbullying between the UK and China. It might be assumed that people working in different countries hold varying perceptions of workplace cyberbullying. In addition, given the lack of research in workplace cyberbullying interventions, it might be necessary to adopt interventions from traditional bullying with modifications considering the unique features of cyberbullying. For further research, findings from the systematic review study suggested that more well-designed studies would be needed to evaluate workplace cyberbullying interventions.
Author: Dong, Sitong
Language: English
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7217498037