Position Paper: Overview of Workplace Bullying in Higher Educational Organizations

Abstract

Bullying in higher education among educators has been researched at the international level and the present evidence strongly exists with need for further research regarding prevention 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Strong empirical research has been published on bullying with viewpoints on the damages to leadership, supervision, incivility and abuse experienced by educators 1, 2, 5, 6. Bullying in higher educational organizations has been observed with antecedents of power, “wanting to get ahead”, favoritism, and other precursors and challenges of incivility leading to bullying 1, 2, 3, 4. Workplace bullying antecedents and effects, describe the possible experiences, background, and precursors, that would reveal workplace bullying 1, 2. Bullying in higher academia can result from behaviours and experiences that show humiliation, overtalking others, aggression, exclusion of others, disengagement of employees, among other subtle ways of silencing others 1, 2, 3, 4, 7. It is therefore still important that educators continue to have a positive, purposeful and productive research driven approach towards solutions for preventing bullying in educational organizations.