To be a Witness - Witnessing Workplace Aggression in Social Service Departments in Israel

Background and Purpose: The current study examines workplace-aggression in municipal social-service departments (MSSDs). Whereas workplace bullying and aggression has been studied in various professional contexts, it has seldom been examined in the context of social-work agencies. Furthermore, while most research focused on the role of being a victim and the role of aggressor, seldom has the role of being a witness to workplace-aggression in social-work agencies been examined. Questions still abide regarding the role of personal level involvement, as well as workplace climate effects. Personal level variables may include belief systems, sense of control, gender, family status, and experience, whereas workplace level variables may include workplace hostile-climate. The goal of the present study was to explore witnessing, its personal and workplace-culture precursors, and outcomes.

Methods: The study was a survey study of workplace relationships among 72 social work teams (490 participants) in Israeli MSSDs. Sampling was a convenience purposive sample, directed at maximizing variation across municipalities. The survey instrument included variables adapted from the Client Violence Questionnaire (CVQ), the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB), and well as measures of stress symptoms (ST). In order to control for within team clustering robust regression analyses were conducted using STATA14.

Findings: Whereas personal attitudes toward aggression wee not associated with witnessing aggression, a worker's subjective norms were significantly associated, so that workers with higher perception of aggression being condoned by other co-workers, reported higher levels of witnessing aggression among co-workers. In similar vein, those who were higher on hostile attribution were more prone to report being a witness. Interestingly, the higher their level of personal sense of control over the situation, the less witnessing they reported. Differences in age were not associated with witnessing.

Examining the outcomes of witnessing, sense of work exhaustion was positively associated with witnessing, as well as tendency for hostile attribution. Sense of control and older age reduced the chances for work-exhaustion. Similarly, experiencing stress symptoms was associated with witnessing co-workers aggression and with a tendency for hostile attribution; whereas sense of control and older age reduced the chances for stress symptoms.

Discussion: While being a victim and being an aggressor of workplace bullying and misconduct have been explored intensively, the role of witnesses, especially withing the contest of social work agencies, has received less attention. The current study examined witnessing co-workers aggression among social workers, some possible antecedents on the personal level, and possible outcomes of witnessing. The results indicate that beliefs regarding workplace social norms and tendency to attribute hostility both end to predict the chances for witnessing co-workers aggression, whereas sense of control tended to be associated with less witnessing. Witnessing was associated also with negative outcomes, both work-exhaustion and stress symptoms. Those results indicated the need for further research in the area, as well as development of workplace interventions directed not only at those directly involved in workplace aggression and bullying but also at those bystanders who are exposed to malignant workplace environment.