Clarifying a Fragmented Theoretical Landscape: A Process Model Approach to Workplace Bullying

Abstract

Frequent reports around the globe continue to fuel scientific and social interest in the pandemic of workplace bullying. Despite this interest, reviewers of the literature still lament difficulty identifying a conceptualization that clearly differentiates bullying from other forms of workplace aggression and victimization (e.g., abusive supervision, harassment, social undermining, etc.). We diagnose the problem underlying this lack of clarity and propose a solution for it. First, we explain how inconsistent and imprecise integration of four qualifiers—incidence, interpretation, intent, and imbalance of power—result in too much distinctiveness between definitions of bullying as well as too little distinctiveness from definitions of other types of workplace aggression and victimization. We then propose and demonstrate how taking a process-theoretical approach to conceptualize workplace bullying mitigates both distinctiveness issues. Doing so leads us to provide a conceptually distinct definition of bullying: a response to goal conflict in which perpetrators falsely convince targets that they are too defenseless and powerless to refuse illegitimate outcomes. We conclude with a discussion regarding how clarifying the concept of workplace bullying this way facilitates progress in developing theories and practical interventions for it.