Citation

Steensma H, van Dijke R. Int. Q. Community Health Educ. 2006; 25(4): 381-392.

Affiliation

Department of Social and Organizational Psychology, Leiden University, The Netherlands. Steensma@fsw.leidenuniv.nl

Copyright

(Copyright © 2006, SAGE Publishing)

DOI

10.2190/9312-064K-67Q7-004Q

PMID

17686709

Abstract

Large-scale surveys in Europe document that some 8-15% of European workers are subjected to intimidation and bullying. Victims of severe bullying in Dutch organizations (N = 21) and non-victims (N = 30) filled out questionnaires. As predicted, victims had a lower Just World Belief, and lower self-esteem than non-victims. Moreover, victims attached higher importance to negative situations than non-victims do. The two groups demonstrated only minor differences in their attributions of internal, and stable causes to negative events. However, victims of bullying attributed causes of bullying significantly more often to specific aspects of situations. In the discussion it is suggested that in future research a distinction should be made between subgroups of victims.

Language: en