Increase in workplace bullying over past ten years

The proportion of people reporting workplace bullying has increased in Finland over the past 10 years. According to the Finnish Quality of Work Life Survey 2008, 44% of wage and salary earners reported at least occasional bullying at their workplace. When asked about their own experiences, only 4% of workers reported being personally subjected to workplace bullying at present, 13% had been bullied previously at their current workplace and 8% at a previous workplace.

About the surveys

The Finnish Quality of Work Life Surveys have included questions about workplace bullying since the 1997 version of the survey. Psychological violence or workplace bullying is defined in the survey questions as ‘isolation of a member of the work community by voiding/nullifying the results of their work, using threatening behaviour, talking about them behind their back or exerting other types of pressure’. Respondents were first asked whether this type of behaviour exists at their workplace and, secondly, whether they are, or have previously been, subjected to this kind of behaviour.

Bullying as a topic of public discussion

The proportion of people who have witnessed bullying at the workplace has increased in each wave of the survey. The largest increase in this regard relates to the observations of women at the turn of the millennium. The extent of this upsurge resulted from the fact that during this period workplace bullying became a topic of public discussion in a completely different way than in 1997; this was discussed in connection with the 2003 Quality of Work Life Survey findings. Workplace bullying became an especially prominent topic following the introduction of the new Finnish Occupational Safety and Health Act in 2003.

However, the proportion of people who have detected workplace bullying has continued to increase between 2003 and 2008. In 2008, more than two out of five (44%) Finnish wage and salary earners reported that bullying took place at their workplace at least occasionally. Six percent of wage and salary earners reported constant bullying at the workplace. Clearly more women had witnessed bullying than men. Half of female wage and salary earners had noticed workplace bullying at least occasionally, while a little over a third of men (36%) reported the same.

Links between bullying and work environment problems

On the other hand, it would be wrong to make a generalisation about the fact that the frequency of bullying in female-dominated sectors of economic activity is connected with the prevalence of women. Bullying is connected to many problems in the work environment, regardless of occupation. Constant bullying is clearly more common in workplaces where time pressure causes a significant degree of strain (14%) than in those where there is no time pressure or time pressure causing, at most, ‘some extent’ of problems (4%). Constant bullying is less frequent at workplaces where the work is well organised (4%) and/or there is sufficient discussion on the work and associated problems (3%), compared with workplaces where the situation is reversed (14% and 13% respectively). In workplaces where the supervisor talks openly about developments and issues at the workplace, less constant bullying occurs (4%) than at workplaces without this sort of openness (11%).

Workers personally subjected to workplace bullying

One in four Finnish wage and salary earners has at some point been subjected to workplace bullying. The proportion is as high as 32%, nearly one in three, for women. Half as many men (16%) report that they have been subjected to workplace bullying at some point. However, these figures include situations that have taken place earlier in their work career, including those from previous workplaces. At the time of the 2008 survey, this was an acute problem for 5% of women and 3% of men (see Figure below).

Workers personally subjected to workplace bullying, by gender, 1997, 2003 and 2008 (%)

Source: Finnish Quality of Work Life Surveys 1997, 2003 and 2008

Workers personally subjected to workplace bullying, by gender, 1997, 2003 and 2008

Bullying leads to problems for whole work community

Workers who are currently subjected to workplace bullying clearly experience psychological and somatic symptoms more frequently than their co-workers who have not been subjected to bullying. Constant bullying at the workplace also increases the psychological and somatic symptoms of workers who are not themselves (currently) being subjected to bullying but are merely bystanders. The least symptoms are experienced by workers whose workplaces exhibit no psychological violence at all. The threat of burnout is also significantly connected to workplace bullying.

Reference

Lehto, A.-M. and Sutela, H., Three decades of working conditions. Findings of Finnish Quality of Work Life Surveys 1977–2008, Helsinki, Statistics Finland, 2009.

Anna-Maija Lehto, Statistics Finland