Bullying among mentally-ill patients detained in a high-secure hospital: an exploratory study of the perceptions of staff and patients into how bullying is defined

Abstract

The present study is the first to explore patient-to-patient bullying within a secure psychiatric hospital housing mentally-ill patients. Its main aim was to provide an outline of the perceptions held by both patients and staff with regards to patient-to-patient bullying as opposed to providing an objective study of bullying. The total sample comprised 104 participants, 44 patients and 60 staff. These were sampled from wards housing male patients and wards housing female patients. All participants took part in a semi-structured interview based on that developed by Ireland and Ireland [2003] and Ireland [2005, 2004]. One quarter of participants stated they had seen a patient being bullied in the previous week, with staff perceiving a higher extent of bullying than patients. Differences between wards were minimal. It was predicted that theft-related bullying would be reported most frequently, that staff would identify a wider range of bullying behaviours than patients and that direct forms of aggression would be identified more readily as bullying than indirect forms. All predictions were supported. Problems in attempting to obtain a definition of bullying were also identified, with participants operating broader definitions than those found in the school-based literature. For example, bullying was not generally considered a repeated form of aggression, the severity of the aggression or provocative behaviour of the victim were not defining features, and it was felt bullying could be accidental. In summary, the current study highlights how patient-to-patient bullying does occur in services housing mentally-ill patients and that researching the behaviour may require the adoption of broader hospital-specific definitions of bullying. Aggr. Behav. 32:1–13, 2006. © 2006 Wiley-Liss, Inc.