Post by Admin on Jul 10, 2015 3:56:26 GMT
Mobbing & Relational Aggression
.............................................
Mobbing is the highest form of cowardice: the most disgusting choice of behavior.
It requires lack of thought, lack of bravery, lack of free-will to allow yourself participation in an event that degrades and willfully harms another human being.
........................
From wikipedia:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobbing
Mobbing in the context of human beings means bullying of an individual by a group in any context; such as a family, friends, peers, school, workplace, neighborhood, community, or online.
When it occurs as emotional abuse in the workplace, such as "ganging up" by co-workers, subordinates or superiors, to force someone out of the workplace through rumor, innuendo, intimidation, humiliation, discrediting, and isolation, it is also referred to as malicious, nonsexual, nonracial, general harassment.
Konrad Lorenz, in his book entitled On Aggression (1966), first described mobbing among birds and animals, attributing it to instincts rooted in the Darwinian struggle to survive (see animal mobbing behavior). In his view, humans are subject to similar innate impulses but capable of bringing them under rational control.
In the 1970s, the Swedish physician Peter-Paul Heinemann applied Lorenz's conceptualization to the collective aggression of children against a targeted child.
In the 1980s, professor and practising psychologist Heinz Leymann applied the term to ganging up in the workplace. Leymann noted that one of the possible side-effects of mobbing is post-traumatic stress disorder and is frequently misdiagnosed. After making this discovery he successfully treated thousands of victims at his clinic in Sweden.
In the workplace
Main article: Workplace bullying
British anti-bully researchers Andrea Adams and Tim Field have used the expression "workplace bullying" instead of what Leymann called "mobbing" in a workplace context. They identify mobbing as a particular type of bullying that is not as apparent as most, defining it as "an emotional assault. It begins when an individual becomes the target of disrespectful and harmful behavior. Through innuendo, rumors, and public discrediting, a hostile environment is created in which one individual gathers others to willingly, or unwillingly, participate in continuous malevolent actions to force a person out of the workplace."
Adams and Field believe that mobbing is typically found in work environments that have poorly organised production or working methods and incapable or inattentive management and that mobbing victims are usually "exceptional individuals who demonstrated intelligence, competence, creativity, integrity, accomplishment and dedication".
Shallcross, Ramsay and Barker consider workplace "mobbing" to be a generally unfamiliar term in some English speaking countries. Some researchers claim that mobbing is simply another name for bullying. Workplace mobbing can be considered as a "virus" or a "cancer" that spreads throughout the workplace via gossip, rumour and unfounded accusations. It is a deliberate attempt to force a person out of their workplace by humiliation, general harassment, emotional abuse and/or terror. Mobbing can be described as being "ganged up on." Mobbing is executed by a leader (who can be a manager, a co-worker, or a subordinate). The leader then rallies others into a systematic and frequent "mob-like" behaviour toward the victim.
Psychological and health effects
Victims of workplace mobbing frequently suffer from: adjustment disorders, somatic symptoms (e.g., headaches or irritable bowel syndrome), psychological trauma, post-traumatic stress disorder and major depression.
In mobbing targets with PTSD, Leymann notes that the "mental effects were fully comparable with PTSD from war or prison camp experiences. Some patients may develop alcoholism or other substance abuse disorders. Family relationships routinely suffer. Some targets may even develop brief psychotic episodes, generally with paranoid symptoms. Leymann estimated that 15% of suicides in Sweden could be directly attributed to workplace mobbing.
Relational Aggression:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relational_aggression
Relational aggression, also known as covert aggression, or covert bullying is a type of aggression in which harm is caused by damaging someone's relationships or social status. Although it can be used in many contexts and among different age groups, relational aggression among adolescents in particular has received a lot of attention. The attention this form of aggression has gotten has been augmented by the help of popular media, including movies like Mean Girls and books like Odd Girl Out by R. Simmons (2003), Nesthäkchen and the World War by Else Ury (1916), and Queen Bees and Wannabes by R. Wiseman (2003). Relational aggression can have various lifelong consequences. Relational aggression has been primarily observed and studied among girls.
Bystanders
Although early research has mostly focused on victims and bullies, currently more and more attention has been given to the roles of other students, or bystanders: bully-reinforcer’s and assistants, victim-defenders, and outsiders.
Bully- reinforcers and assistants
Bully-reinforcers and assistants do not normally initiate aggressive actions themselves, but they support, reinforce, and/or assist the bully. They often have rather large friendship networks when compared to outsiders, victims, and their defenders. These individuals are similar to bullies in regards of their personal characteristics. Female bully- reinforcers and assistants usually score low on social acceptance and high on rejection by their peers while male bully assistants have average scores on both and bully- reinforcers are often quite popular among their peers. The characteristic that is common among all these individuals across both genders is low level of empathy.
Victim-defenders
Victim-defenders are individuals who stand up for the victim. They are usually popular among their peers, although occasionally rejected and victimized adolescents take on the defender’s role. Defenders like to befriend other defenders and usually belong to the smallest social network of all other previously mentioned groups. Defenders have both advanced moral competence and high level of compassion. They also score high on the theory of mind tests. They are usually very morally engaged, have a high sense of responsibility, and self-efficacy. They are also good at emotion regulation.
Outsiders
Outsiders are adolescents who like to stay away from the conflict situations, participate in spreading rumors, or actively support either side. They usually befriend other outsiders. Both male and female outsiders usually score below average on both social acceptance and rejection by their peers. In general, the best predictor for whether an adolescent will choose to be a defender or an outsider in a particular situation is their relationship to the victim and/or bully. Occasionally, adolescents will feel more comfortable to intervene if they are friends of the offender. However, in general they will take the side of the bully or victim based on who they know better. Bullies are more likely to be friends of other bullies, as well as their reinforcers, and assistants, while victims befriend other victims.
Consequences of victimization
There are serious negative consequences associated with being involved in any aggressive behaviors. And while problems with peers might be a result of one’s poor social skills and maladjustment, difficulty making friends, and regular experience of aggression can also be a cause of many short and long term negative consequences on one’s mental health and academic and professional achievements.
Experience of relational aggression, peer rejection, and unpopularity are shown to be linked to various problems in adolescence, which are listed below:
depression
behavior problems;
poor social skills;
lack of close peer relationships;
difficulties in academic performance;
low school engagement;
undermined feelings of competence;
low self-esteem
occasionally distress due to victimization can also result in physical symptoms such as wetting, abdominal pain, or/and headaches.
Some negative effects persist into adulthood. In a longitudinal study, Dan Olweus (2003) found that young adults, who were victims of bullying in adolescence, had more symptoms of depression and lower self-esteem than did their non-victimized peers. Victims are also much more likely to engage in heavy smoking later in life. Decreased academic engagement due to victimization can have some long term consequences as victim's lower educational attainment in adulthood leads to lower earnings.
Differences in consequences of victimization for victims and bully-victims:
There are differences in consequences among the children who are rejected and aggressive, also known as bully-victims, and children who are rejected and withdrawn, also referred to as simply victims. Aggressive individuals often have conduct problems and are involved in antisocial activity; withdrawn children feel exceedingly lonely, at risk of low self-esteem, depression, and diminished social competence. Adolescents, who are both aggressive and withdrawn, are at greatest risk for various mental and behavioral problems.
Suicide ideation and attempts
Although victims respond to bullying in various ways, some of the most common ways include avoidance or escape behaviors, such as not going to school and running away from home. However, in some extreme cases, suicide attempts might occur. Compared to non-victims, victims exhibit increased levels of suicidal ideation, and are more likely to have attempted suicide. Researcher Y.S. Kim (2005) found that there are some gender differences as victimized female but not male students were at significantly greater risk for suicidal ideation. Further research has shown that increased risk for suicidal ideation and attempts depend on a specific interaction between gender, frequency, and type of aggression. Relational or indirect aggression was found to be associated with depression and suicidal ideation among both genders. According to Brustein and Klomek (2007), victimization at any frequency increased the risk of depression, ideation, and attempts among girls, while only frequent victimization increased the risk of depression and ideation among males, yet Katliala-Heino et al.(1999) found that severe ideation was associated with frequent victimization only among girls.
Environmental buffers and prevention programs
Some adolescents are more resilient to victimization due to their personal characteristics, but there are some environmental factors such as having a best friend or great family support can decrease the risk for many negative consequences associated with victimization.
In addition, research shows that support from teachers can be a significant environmental factor for higher academic achievement and school engagement. It can also increase general well- being in the classroom. Teacher attitudes towards bullying were found to moderate the extent to which victims internalize and feel distressed and express it by avoiding school and similar behavior. Close teacher- student relationship moderates perceived safety in the classroom, and higher perceived safety is directly linked to better classroom concentration and improved coping strategies.
Therefore, supportive friends, family, and teachers can be great buffers for victimized students against all negative effects of victimization. Interestingly, witnessing the harassment of others can also reduce some harmful effects of being victimized: victims-only feel more humiliated and angry than victims-witnesses on the same day. Being singled out and picked on feels worse than being one of many victimized students. This explains why in ethnically diverse schools victimized students experience worse psychological outcomes when their ethnic group is in majority, because then they are more likely to attribute it to their personal shortcomings and not to their group membership.
Prevention programs
There are many prevention programs, which have been designed to improve social skills of the unpopular and victimized adolescents.
Prevention programs usually focus on one of the three strategies:
1. teaching social skills like self-expression, leadership, and questioning of others about themselves;
2. have unpopular adolescents participate in group activities together with the popular adolescents under supervision of psychologists;
3. some programs focus on training on how to combine and use one's cognitive and behavioral abilities, including social problem solving.
Different types of programs have shown to have somewhat different effects: the first type seems to best improve adolescent’s ability to get along with others while the second type has shown to improve adolescents’ self-conceptions and their acceptance by others. One of the examples of the programs using the third approach is PATHS (Promoting Alternative Thinking Strategies) teaches skills needed for successfully analyzing social situations, controlling one’s negative emotions, and making more rational social decisions. It has been shown to successfully reduce behavioral problems among elementary school children. However, it is difficult to prevent relational aggression from happening as often adolescents who use it are seen to be more popular among their peers.
.............................................
Mobbing is the highest form of cowardice: the most disgusting choice of behavior.
It requires lack of thought, lack of bravery, lack of free-will to allow yourself participation in an event that degrades and willfully harms another human being.
........................
From wikipedia:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobbing
Mobbing in the context of human beings means bullying of an individual by a group in any context; such as a family, friends, peers, school, workplace, neighborhood, community, or online.
When it occurs as emotional abuse in the workplace, such as "ganging up" by co-workers, subordinates or superiors, to force someone out of the workplace through rumor, innuendo, intimidation, humiliation, discrediting, and isolation, it is also referred to as malicious, nonsexual, nonracial, general harassment.
Konrad Lorenz, in his book entitled On Aggression (1966), first described mobbing among birds and animals, attributing it to instincts rooted in the Darwinian struggle to survive (see animal mobbing behavior). In his view, humans are subject to similar innate impulses but capable of bringing them under rational control.
In the 1970s, the Swedish physician Peter-Paul Heinemann applied Lorenz's conceptualization to the collective aggression of children against a targeted child.
In the 1980s, professor and practising psychologist Heinz Leymann applied the term to ganging up in the workplace. Leymann noted that one of the possible side-effects of mobbing is post-traumatic stress disorder and is frequently misdiagnosed. After making this discovery he successfully treated thousands of victims at his clinic in Sweden.
In the workplace
Main article: Workplace bullying
British anti-bully researchers Andrea Adams and Tim Field have used the expression "workplace bullying" instead of what Leymann called "mobbing" in a workplace context. They identify mobbing as a particular type of bullying that is not as apparent as most, defining it as "an emotional assault. It begins when an individual becomes the target of disrespectful and harmful behavior. Through innuendo, rumors, and public discrediting, a hostile environment is created in which one individual gathers others to willingly, or unwillingly, participate in continuous malevolent actions to force a person out of the workplace."
Adams and Field believe that mobbing is typically found in work environments that have poorly organised production or working methods and incapable or inattentive management and that mobbing victims are usually "exceptional individuals who demonstrated intelligence, competence, creativity, integrity, accomplishment and dedication".
Shallcross, Ramsay and Barker consider workplace "mobbing" to be a generally unfamiliar term in some English speaking countries. Some researchers claim that mobbing is simply another name for bullying. Workplace mobbing can be considered as a "virus" or a "cancer" that spreads throughout the workplace via gossip, rumour and unfounded accusations. It is a deliberate attempt to force a person out of their workplace by humiliation, general harassment, emotional abuse and/or terror. Mobbing can be described as being "ganged up on." Mobbing is executed by a leader (who can be a manager, a co-worker, or a subordinate). The leader then rallies others into a systematic and frequent "mob-like" behaviour toward the victim.
Psychological and health effects
Victims of workplace mobbing frequently suffer from: adjustment disorders, somatic symptoms (e.g., headaches or irritable bowel syndrome), psychological trauma, post-traumatic stress disorder and major depression.
In mobbing targets with PTSD, Leymann notes that the "mental effects were fully comparable with PTSD from war or prison camp experiences. Some patients may develop alcoholism or other substance abuse disorders. Family relationships routinely suffer. Some targets may even develop brief psychotic episodes, generally with paranoid symptoms. Leymann estimated that 15% of suicides in Sweden could be directly attributed to workplace mobbing.
Relational Aggression:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relational_aggression
Relational aggression, also known as covert aggression, or covert bullying is a type of aggression in which harm is caused by damaging someone's relationships or social status. Although it can be used in many contexts and among different age groups, relational aggression among adolescents in particular has received a lot of attention. The attention this form of aggression has gotten has been augmented by the help of popular media, including movies like Mean Girls and books like Odd Girl Out by R. Simmons (2003), Nesthäkchen and the World War by Else Ury (1916), and Queen Bees and Wannabes by R. Wiseman (2003). Relational aggression can have various lifelong consequences. Relational aggression has been primarily observed and studied among girls.
Bystanders
Although early research has mostly focused on victims and bullies, currently more and more attention has been given to the roles of other students, or bystanders: bully-reinforcer’s and assistants, victim-defenders, and outsiders.
Bully- reinforcers and assistants
Bully-reinforcers and assistants do not normally initiate aggressive actions themselves, but they support, reinforce, and/or assist the bully. They often have rather large friendship networks when compared to outsiders, victims, and their defenders. These individuals are similar to bullies in regards of their personal characteristics. Female bully- reinforcers and assistants usually score low on social acceptance and high on rejection by their peers while male bully assistants have average scores on both and bully- reinforcers are often quite popular among their peers. The characteristic that is common among all these individuals across both genders is low level of empathy.
Victim-defenders
Victim-defenders are individuals who stand up for the victim. They are usually popular among their peers, although occasionally rejected and victimized adolescents take on the defender’s role. Defenders like to befriend other defenders and usually belong to the smallest social network of all other previously mentioned groups. Defenders have both advanced moral competence and high level of compassion. They also score high on the theory of mind tests. They are usually very morally engaged, have a high sense of responsibility, and self-efficacy. They are also good at emotion regulation.
Outsiders
Outsiders are adolescents who like to stay away from the conflict situations, participate in spreading rumors, or actively support either side. They usually befriend other outsiders. Both male and female outsiders usually score below average on both social acceptance and rejection by their peers. In general, the best predictor for whether an adolescent will choose to be a defender or an outsider in a particular situation is their relationship to the victim and/or bully. Occasionally, adolescents will feel more comfortable to intervene if they are friends of the offender. However, in general they will take the side of the bully or victim based on who they know better. Bullies are more likely to be friends of other bullies, as well as their reinforcers, and assistants, while victims befriend other victims.
Consequences of victimization
There are serious negative consequences associated with being involved in any aggressive behaviors. And while problems with peers might be a result of one’s poor social skills and maladjustment, difficulty making friends, and regular experience of aggression can also be a cause of many short and long term negative consequences on one’s mental health and academic and professional achievements.
Experience of relational aggression, peer rejection, and unpopularity are shown to be linked to various problems in adolescence, which are listed below:
depression
behavior problems;
poor social skills;
lack of close peer relationships;
difficulties in academic performance;
low school engagement;
undermined feelings of competence;
low self-esteem
occasionally distress due to victimization can also result in physical symptoms such as wetting, abdominal pain, or/and headaches.
Some negative effects persist into adulthood. In a longitudinal study, Dan Olweus (2003) found that young adults, who were victims of bullying in adolescence, had more symptoms of depression and lower self-esteem than did their non-victimized peers. Victims are also much more likely to engage in heavy smoking later in life. Decreased academic engagement due to victimization can have some long term consequences as victim's lower educational attainment in adulthood leads to lower earnings.
Differences in consequences of victimization for victims and bully-victims:
There are differences in consequences among the children who are rejected and aggressive, also known as bully-victims, and children who are rejected and withdrawn, also referred to as simply victims. Aggressive individuals often have conduct problems and are involved in antisocial activity; withdrawn children feel exceedingly lonely, at risk of low self-esteem, depression, and diminished social competence. Adolescents, who are both aggressive and withdrawn, are at greatest risk for various mental and behavioral problems.
Suicide ideation and attempts
Although victims respond to bullying in various ways, some of the most common ways include avoidance or escape behaviors, such as not going to school and running away from home. However, in some extreme cases, suicide attempts might occur. Compared to non-victims, victims exhibit increased levels of suicidal ideation, and are more likely to have attempted suicide. Researcher Y.S. Kim (2005) found that there are some gender differences as victimized female but not male students were at significantly greater risk for suicidal ideation. Further research has shown that increased risk for suicidal ideation and attempts depend on a specific interaction between gender, frequency, and type of aggression. Relational or indirect aggression was found to be associated with depression and suicidal ideation among both genders. According to Brustein and Klomek (2007), victimization at any frequency increased the risk of depression, ideation, and attempts among girls, while only frequent victimization increased the risk of depression and ideation among males, yet Katliala-Heino et al.(1999) found that severe ideation was associated with frequent victimization only among girls.
Environmental buffers and prevention programs
Some adolescents are more resilient to victimization due to their personal characteristics, but there are some environmental factors such as having a best friend or great family support can decrease the risk for many negative consequences associated with victimization.
In addition, research shows that support from teachers can be a significant environmental factor for higher academic achievement and school engagement. It can also increase general well- being in the classroom. Teacher attitudes towards bullying were found to moderate the extent to which victims internalize and feel distressed and express it by avoiding school and similar behavior. Close teacher- student relationship moderates perceived safety in the classroom, and higher perceived safety is directly linked to better classroom concentration and improved coping strategies.
Therefore, supportive friends, family, and teachers can be great buffers for victimized students against all negative effects of victimization. Interestingly, witnessing the harassment of others can also reduce some harmful effects of being victimized: victims-only feel more humiliated and angry than victims-witnesses on the same day. Being singled out and picked on feels worse than being one of many victimized students. This explains why in ethnically diverse schools victimized students experience worse psychological outcomes when their ethnic group is in majority, because then they are more likely to attribute it to their personal shortcomings and not to their group membership.
Prevention programs
There are many prevention programs, which have been designed to improve social skills of the unpopular and victimized adolescents.
Prevention programs usually focus on one of the three strategies:
1. teaching social skills like self-expression, leadership, and questioning of others about themselves;
2. have unpopular adolescents participate in group activities together with the popular adolescents under supervision of psychologists;
3. some programs focus on training on how to combine and use one's cognitive and behavioral abilities, including social problem solving.
Different types of programs have shown to have somewhat different effects: the first type seems to best improve adolescent’s ability to get along with others while the second type has shown to improve adolescents’ self-conceptions and their acceptance by others. One of the examples of the programs using the third approach is PATHS (Promoting Alternative Thinking Strategies) teaches skills needed for successfully analyzing social situations, controlling one’s negative emotions, and making more rational social decisions. It has been shown to successfully reduce behavioral problems among elementary school children. However, it is difficult to prevent relational aggression from happening as often adolescents who use it are seen to be more popular among their peers.