Психология /4.Психология терроризма

Asocciated Professor, Ph.D., Jolita Vveinhardt

Vytautas Magnus University, Lithuania

Mobbing as Discrimination in Employees’ Relationships: Tendencies in Recreation and Tourism Sectors in Lithuania

Relevance of the research.

The phenomenon of mobbing is being analyzed for three decades in the West. Leymann (1990) – the scientist from Sweden is considered to be the initiator of the research. While analyzing the works devoted to discrimination, for example, (Leymann, 1990; Knorz, Zapf, 1995; Einarsen, 2000; Vartia-Vaananen, 2003; Vveinhardt, 2011 etc.) the connections between mobbing and discrimination actions become very clear. Mobbing as discrimination in employees’ relationships reveals disfunctionality of interpersonal relationships in organizations, which is based on intensive and long-term oppression of the chosen victim that is expressed by time an duration criteria. Mobbing actions are of discriminative nature but discriminating behavior does not always grow into mobbing. In other words the employee that has experienced mobbing has as well experienced discrimination but discrimination not always grows into mobbing. Discrimination in employees’ relationships is division of people that is not related with objective professional and formal features, professional activities, more often – with sociocultural stereotype, devaluation caused by superstitions, application of different standards. Mobbing actions are expressed through chicaneries in social, communicative, personal, professional and other spheres, in tactics accepted as social isolation, concealment of work-related information, threatening, humiliation of honor and dignity, professional devaluation, physical and psychological discomfort that can cause psychosomatic disorders on purpose to outcast the victim from the organization. The main reasons of emergence of this phenomenon are personal, sociopsychological and org-managerial that reveals the problems of culture and climate in organization; it is induced by such individual aspects as jealousy, rivalry, frustration, incompetence, irrational fear about one’s own place of work, etc. All this creates negative climate in organization and can become the main reason of employees’ loss.

Methods. The instrument that has been used for diagnosis of mobbing as discrimination in employees’ relationships when improving climate of Lithuanian organizations consists of the following: interview, expert evaluations, partially structured interview and close-type questionnaire. When making a diagnosing instrument the content of characteristics and criteria was determined by accumulative theoretic knowledge in human resources management and organizational behavior sciences about employees’ interrelationships, mobbing as discrimination in employees’ relationships and climate of organization. Construction of instrument in the research embraces five stages. The first stage: theoretic analysis on discrimination, mobbing, conceptions of climate in organization has been conducted; the researches by the scientists that have analyzed the phenomena have been analyzed; preliminary characteristics have been singled out. The second stage: diagnostic model of mobbing as discrimination in employees’ relationships has been constructed; preliminary criteria have been singled out; a questionnaire for the first expert evaluation has been prepared; questionnaires for the experts that have agreed to participate in evaluation have been shared; the results if expert evaluations have been accumulated; averages of criteria weight have been calculated. The third stage: preliminary indicators have been singled out; a questionnaire for the second expert evaluation has been prepared, on purpose to calculate a more precise average of criteria weight five categories of the answers have been introduced. The fourth stage: before an exploratory research questioning of the specialists in the way of interview has been conducted on purpose to check whether the phenomenon of mobbing exists, if the researches of this type are in need, how widely this phenomenon has disseminated in Lithuanian organizations, what the ways it is expressed through the relationships of employees are; apart from this, our aim was to find out if the victims of mobbing could get urgent and professional help in Lithuania. Characteristics and criteria have been singled out, a questionnaire to conduct an exploratory research has been constructed; the exploratory research after having questioned 351 respondents has been conducted; high reliability of the instrument has been set; The fifth stage: diagnostic instrument has been improved (removing drawbacks and supplementing), the main research after having questioned 1379 respondents that represented 22 spheres of professional activities in Lithuania has been conducted. In the present paper the results of two of them – hotel and restaurant sphere as well as leisure organization, cultural and sports sphere activities have been presented.

Results and discussion. It has been set that the employees in hotels and restaurants experience mobbing more often than discrimination; in the organizations that provide leisure, cultural and sports activities the situation is very similar – mobbing is as well experienced more often than discrimination. The data of the research in this sphere showed that here mobbing as well as discrimination can be experienced, only mobbing is likely to be more intensive. It has been set that mobbing in tourism and recreation spheres in comparison with other activities, i.e. in general context embraces 13,4 per cent. In professional sphere of leisure organization, cultural and sports activities – 5,5 per cent, in the professional activities sphere of hotels and restaurants – 7,9 per cent.

References:

1. Einarsen S. Harassment and bullying at work: a review of the Scandinavian approach. Aggression and Violent Behavior, Vol. 5, No. 4. 2000. – P.379–401.

2. Knorz C., Zapf, D. Mobbing: Eine extreme Form sozialer Stressoren am Arbeitsplatz // Zeitschrift fuer Arbeits und Organisationspsychologie, No. 1. 1995. – P.12–22.

3. Leymann H. Mobbing and Psychological Terror at workplaces. Violence and Victims, Vol. 5, No. 2. 1990. – P.119–126.

4. Vartia–Vaananen M. Workplace bullying – a study on the work environment, well–being and health. Doctor of Psychology Dissertation. University of Helsinki, Sweeden, 2003.

5. Vveinhardt Jolita. The structurogram of the mobbing diagnostic model // Transformations in business and economics, Vol. 10, iss. 2A (23A). 2011. – P.317-333.