The impact of methodological moderators on prevalence rates of workplace bullying. A meta-analysis

The aim of this study was to investigate how different measurement methods and sampling techniques contribute to the observed variation in prevalence rates of workplace bullying. A total of 102 prevalence estimates of bullying from 86 independent samples (N=130,973) were accumulated and compared by...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of occupational and organizational psychology 2010-12, Vol.83 (4), p.955-979
Main Authors: Nielsen, Morten Birkeland, Matthiesen, Stig Berge, Einarsen, Ståle
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Biological and medical sciences
Bullying
Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology
Geoarchaeology
Measurement
Moderators
Occupational psychology
Prevalence
Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry
Psychology. Psychophysiology
Sampling
Work condition. Job performance. Stress
Work environment
Work standards
Workplaces
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:The aim of this study was to investigate how different measurement methods and sampling techniques contribute to the observed variation in prevalence rates of workplace bullying. A total of 102 prevalence estimates of bullying from 86 independent samples (N=130,973) were accumulated and compared by means of meta‐analysis. At an average, the statistically independents samples provided an estimate of 14.6%. Yet, the findings show that methodological moderators influence the estimated rates. As for measurement method, a rate of 11.3% was found for studies investigating self‐labelled victimization from bullying based on a given definition of the concept, whereas a rate of 14.8% was found for behavioural measure studies, and 18.1% for self‐labelling studies without a given definition. A difference of 8.7% points was found between randomly sampled and non‐randomly sampled studies. When controlling for geographical differences, the findings show that geographical factors also influence findings on bullying. Hence, findings from different studies on workplace bullying cannot be compared without taking moderator variables into account.
ISSN:0963-1798
2044-8325
DOI:10.1348/096317909X481256