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19 Cases of Bullying among Real and Overwhelming Youth

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Last Updated on April 13, 2023 by Mike Robinson

We present 19 cases of real bullying and cyberbullying characterized by their fatal outcomes and the lack of training of education professionals.  The cases and stories of bullying in schools and outside them with cyberbullying have multiplied in recent years.

Bullying can cause severe mental distress. The cases of adolescents and minors who take their own lives due to the different types of bullying should be alarming to educational professionals. Schools must implement immediate and decisive actions to curtail this unacceptable behavior trend. 

1-Miriam, eight years old

Miriam is an eight-year-old girl who goes to elementary school. She loves animals, so she always has pictures of them in her books. She even has a backpack shaped like a puppy.

Her companions laugh and make fun of her, comparing her with the animals on the stickers on her backpack because she is overweight. Also, since she is “fat,” they take her money and snacks at recess.

Although she has told the teachers repeatedly, they have not done much to change the situation. To try to improve the situation, Miriam stopped eating and is in the hospital for anorexia.

2-Tania: Fourteen years old.

Tania, a 14-year-old teenager, has tried to commit suicide due to her high school classmates’ continuous threats, robberies, and aggressions. The situation has not changed despite filing 20 complaints against 19 of her classmates.

In January 2014, she was admitted to the hospital for 15 days due to an overdose of Valium pills. Despite her attempted suicide, the threats are still ongoing.

3-Diego: Eleven years old

It is a recent case of school bullying in Spain; Diego, an eleven-year-old boy, was a victim of this practice in a school in Madrid.

His mother remembers that her son told her he did not want to go to school, so his mood was always very sad; once, he lost his voice because of a blow he had suffered at school from his classmates.

The day he committed suicide, his mother went to pick him up at school, and he ran frantically to the car to get out safely. Later that evening, he killed himself.

4-Jokin Z: Fourteen years old

It was one of the first cases of bullying that came to light in Spain. After being bullied for months, he decided to commit suicide. The parents felt helpless. They tried for two years to prevent this tragedy and remove the suffering of their teenage son.

As a result of his suicide, eight students had charges brought against them. The parents were also arrested. However, only one individual was convicted. 

5-Jairo: Sixteen years old

Jairo is a 16-year-old boy from a town in Seville who faced severe bullying because of his physical disability. He has a prosthetic leg due to a wrong operation. His classmates continually make fun of him and his disability.

Not only did they trip him, but they also tried to take it off in the gymnastics class. On the other hand, in the social networks, there were photos of him manipulated with computer programs with bad words that made Jairo not want to go to school.

Due to the suffering caused by this type of behavior, Jairo asked to change schools and is currently at another institute.

6-Yaiza: Seven years old

At seven years old, Yaiza suffered bullying from her classmates. They insulted her continuously, to the point that Yaiza had difficulty convincing herself that what her classmates told her was false.  Not only did they insult her, but they also stole her breakfast and even once threw a table at her.

She was fortunate to have a teacher who was involved in the issue of bullying and helped make changes at the school. The teacher brought attention to bullying to better understand why these practices occur in schools.

7-Alan: Seventeen years old

This seventeen-year-old teenager was bullied by his classmates because he was a transsexual. He took his life on December 30, 2015, after taking pills mixed with alcohol.

It was not the first time he tried since he had been receiving therapy numerous times because he had suffered for years. As in other cases, Alan was no longer in school, but that was not enough.

8-Ryan: Fourteen years old

After years of psychological aggression, in 2003, Ryan, then fourteen years old, decided to commit suicide. He did so because he was supposedly gay. It all started because a friend of his published online that he was homosexual.

Because of this, he did not stop receiving jokes, ridicule, and humiliation from his classmates. This case helped to approve the Harassment Prevention Act in Vermont of the US States months after his death.

9-Arancha: Sixteen years old

This 16-year-old girl decided to throw herself from the sixth floor. The reason was the bullying she suffered from classmates in Madrid.

Arancha suffered from motor and intellectual disabilities, which was more than enough for her class to bully her. Although her parents reported this fact to the police, it was not enough to prevent the fatal outcome.

Minutes before launching herself from the building, she said goodbye to the people closest to her by sending them a message through WhatsApp, saying, “I was tired of living.”

10-Lolita: Fifteen years old

Lolita is currently under medical treatment due to the depression she suffers, which has paralyzed her face. This young woman from Maip, Chile, was bullied by four classmates at her school.

Her classmates mocked and humiliated her in class, which seriously affected her. According to the mother, the school knew about her daughter’s mistreatment and did nothing to prevent it.

11-Rebecca: Fifteen years

The case of Rebecca from the state of Florida is an example of cyberbullying. She decided to take her own life in 2013 due to the continuous threats and humiliations suffered by colleagues on social networks.

She and her mother had informed the teachers at school of this situation. Unfortunately, they did not work to stop the attacks on her. She posted on her profile days before her death, “I’m dead. “I cannot stand it anymore.”

12-Phoebe Prince: Fifteen years old

This 15-year-old Irish immigrant girl was harassed by nine teenagers who had criminal charges brought up in 2010. She was bullied physically and psychologically, and there was cyberbullying through cell phones and the internet.

Phoebe was humiliated and assaulted for three months in high school until she ended up hanging herself. The people who harassed her continued to do so even after her death.

13-Rehtaeh: Fifteen years old

This girl from Halifax, Nova Scotia, decided to hang herself in her bathroom after suffering cyber bullying. Her schoolmates and strangers took part in the bullying. Rehtaeh got drunk at a party, where, apart from raping her, they photographed her while it happened.

This photo began circulating everywhere, so even kids she did not know asked her to sleep with them on social networks. Her classmates also insulted her and made fun of her.

14-Oscar: Thirteen years old

This minor, who is 13 years old and in the first year of secondary school, decided to ingest liquid drain cleaner for pipes for the sole purpose of not going to school. Oscar was harassed not only by his classmates but also by one of his teachers.

Oscar could not contain the urge to go to the bathroom due to a urinary problem. His teacher never let him go, so he once urinated on himself.  From that moment on, he had to deal with the treatment he received from his teacher and his classmates, who made fun of him and insulted him repeatedly.

15-Monica: Sixteen years old

Mónica lived in Ciudad Real (Spain) and was 16 years old when she decided to commit suicide because of the treatment she received at school from her classmates. They would insult her on the bus, threaten her, and publish photos and nasty comments on social networks.

She decided to commit suicide to end all the hell that her classmates made her go through. Even though her father, one day before he took his own life, complained to the head of studies about what was happening to his daughter.

16-María: Eleven years old

This girl from Madrid (Spain) suffered harassment from her classmates at a religious school. Her classmates not only made fun of her but even physically mistreated her.

Teachers disputed these claims and did not defend her or take measures to stop them from happening. Because of this, she tried to overdose on pills without success.

17-Amanda: Fifteen years old

Amanda, a Canadian-born minor, committed suicide after posting a video on social media reporting that she was suffering bullying.

It all started when he sent a topless photo of herself to a stranger on the webcam; from that moment, insults and harassment began on the internet.

This bullying lasted three years. Amanda even changed schools to rebuild her life, but it did not help. The abuse caused anxiety and acute depression that led her to consume drugs.

18-Zaira: Fifteen years old

Here is another victim of bullying from classmates. In the case of Zaira, it all started when they recorded her with a cell phone while she was in the bathroom.  These girls spread the video among all the school’s classmates and others outside her school. 

Because of these recordings, Zaira had to take the continuous teasing of her classmates and even physical abuse. Thanks to a lower-class classmate, she faced bullying, and this story had a happy ending.

19-Marco: Eleven years

This child had spent five years enduring the harassment he suffered from his classmates. They made fun of him because he was supposedly overweight, although, in reality, he was not.

They humiliated him on many occasions, and once, they even took off his clothes in gym class.  A teacher knew what was happening to him and did not take action. Marco is currently in another school after telling him everything that happened to his parents.

Conclusions About Bullying

These 19 cases are only 19 of many in our schools. These examples show the flaws that exist in education systems worldwide. The education system professionals are not doing enough to address these abuses.

Despite all we know about bullying, there still needs to be more information about its prevention and action. The schools are not prepared to face this type of situation, leading them to ignore this behavior in their students and leave the families alone with this problem.

Also Read:  11 Human Body Games for Children

To reduce the number of suicides due to school bullying in children, we must educate everyone involved. By providing adequate training, people will know what guidelines to follow in these situations to prevent adolescent suicide.

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Bullying: A Case Study Revisited

Cruelty and its impact, years later.

Posted April 9, 2015

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Several years ago, a teacher shared a scenario that exemplified how crafty and insidious bullying can be. I blogged about it at the time and reprinted the story here—as well as a followed up with the young victim:

From the outside, the abuse looked innocuous enough—kids around a table in the cafeteria, singing fragments of popular songs and laughing . Nothing to catch the attention of monitors—until another student bade a young teacher to listen carefully to the lyrics. Muse’s popular song was only tweaked, becoming "Far away / you can’t be far enough away / far away from the people who don’t care if you live or die." Instead of Lady Gaga’s lyrics, the kids chanted “you are so ugly / you are a disease. The boys don’t even want what you’re givin’ for free. No one wants your Love / Ew, yuck, ew / you’re such a joke.” Instead of Beyonce’s, “If you like it then you should’ve put a ring on it,” they sang “you’re a f*#% up and loser put a bag on it.” The repertoire was extensive, and new songs were added every week.

By and large, the students were careful to write lyrics that would pass censorship and not attract attention to themselves for profanity. They delighted in their own cleverness, and in their ability to get many uninvolved bystanders to sing a chorus as they waited in the food line. In other words, the humiliation of one girl became a popular bonding experience, and ad-libbing new lyrics was a way to get positive peer attention.

As they saw it, it was all just a joke. Ha Ha. Can’t she take a little joke?

Recently, I tracked down the victim (she is at a top-tier college) and she agreed to reflect on her experiences. I first asked whether she remembered the correct lyrics to those songs, all these years later. My mistake. I assumed the alternate lyrics were seared into her brain. Instead, she told me she had forgotten the revised songs, and would not have recalled the lyrics had I not transcribed them, years ago. When I asked whether she had ever gotten an apology , or if one would change anything now, she didn’t think there was any need.

Gratifying as it was to see her doing well, these were not the responses I anticipated. But as parents and educators think about bullying, it is important to keep in mind that not all incidents—not even all ongoing cruelties that clearly affect a young adult—will scar her for life. And that we may, at times, do a disservice to young people by rushing in to fix what we perceive as threatening, undermining their own abilities to handle it.

Our inability to gauge resilience is complicated by the fact that much cruelty lies in intersubjective nuances that are equally impossible to grasp, let alone gauge. However, much of the capacity for reparation lies in those nuances as well.

To my mind, singing cruelly revised songs (and encouraging others to sing along) was ongoing abuse, one that called for an intervention. However, "loud singing on the bus" was the only concrete issue that was ever addressed. The victim herself refused any involvement of school authorities, and—as she appears to be thriving—it seems this was the "right call" on her part. (Was it that she could not quite define herself as a victim? That she was handling her "victimization" in ways that adults could not see? That the teacher saw to it that ringleaders got in trouble for unrelated offenses? That—appearances to the contrary—she is burdened by insecurity and secret shame ?)

Interviewing this young woman prompted me to track down, and reconsider, something Clive Seale wrote almost two decades ago:

“in the ebb and flow of everyday interactions, as has been conveyed so effectively in the work of [Erving] Goffman, there exist numerous opportunities for small psychic losses, exclusions and humiliations, alternating with moments of repair and optimism . [Thomas] Scheff (1990) has sought to understand this quality of everyday interaction as consisting of cycles of shame and pride as the social bond is alternately damaged and repaired. The experience of loss and repair is, then, a daily event. In this sense “ bereavement ” (and recovery from it) describes the continual daily acknowledgement of the problem of human embodiment.” (1998)

To adults looking on, cruel song lyrics certainly seem a large "ebb" in the flow of this young student’s life—one requiring intervention. Her story, however, reminds us that as we forge ahead, looking for ways to protect our children against bullying, we must simultaneously enable them to negotiate the "ebbs" in life. A first step in this may simply involve helping them identify the "flow." This is not to lessen active response to bullying, or to sweep it under the rug, but to teach our children to challenge the negative self-narratives that form around bullying experiences. And—perhaps more importantly—to teach them that as bystanders, they contribute to the narratives of others (either implicitly or explicitly). At the risk of sounding Pollyannaish, the identification of counter-factual evidence may go far in challenging this negativity. It turns out, this is precisely what this young women was able to—though a group of friends outside the school environment, who not only raised awareness of, but contributed to, her flow.

Laura Martocci, Ph.D . is a Social Psychologist known for her work on bullying and shame. A former faculty member and dean at Wagner College, her current work centers around identity (re)construction and the transformative potential in change.

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Western Journal of Emergency Medicine: Integrating Emergency Care with Population Health

A Case Study with an Identified Bully: Policy and Practice Implications

• Huddleston, Lillie B ;
• Varjas, Kris ;
• Meyers, Joel ;
• Cadenhead, Catherine

Objective: Bullying is a serious public health problem that may include verbal or physical injury as well as social isolation or exclusion. As a result, research is needed to establish a database for policies and interventions designed to prevent bullying and its negative effects. This paper presented a case study that contributed to the literature by describing an intervention for bullies that has implications for research, practice and related policies regarding bullying.

Methods: An individualized intervention for an identified bully was implemented using the Participatory Culture-Specific Intervention Model (PCSIM; Nastasi, Moore, & Varjas, 2004) with a seventh-grade middle school student. Ecological and culture-specific perspectives were used to develop and implement the intervention that included psychoeducational sessions with the student and consultation with the parent and school personnel. A mixed methods intervention design was used with the following informants: the target student, the mother of the student, a teacher and the school counselor. Qualitative data included semi-structured interviews with the parent, teacher and student, narrative classroom observations and evaluation/feedback forms filled out by the student and interventionist. Quantitative data included the following quantitative surveys (i.e., Child Posttraumatic Stress Reaction Index [CPTS-RI] and the Behavior Assessment Scale for Children, 2nd Edition). Both qualitative and quantitative data were used to evaluate the acceptability, integrity and efficacy of this intervention.

Results: The process of intervention design, implementation and evaluation are described through an illustrative case study. Qualitative and quantitative findings indicated a decrease in internalizing, externalizing and bullying behaviors as reported by the teacher and the mother, and a high degree of acceptability and treatment integrity as reported by multiple stakeholders.

Conclusion: This case study provided important contributions by describing an intervention that is targeted to specific needs of the bully by designing culture specific interventions and working with the student’s unique environmental contexts. Additional contributions included the use of mixed methods to document acceptability, integrity and efficacy of an intervention with documented positive effects in these areas. In addition, implications for policy and practice related to the treatment of students identified as bullies and future research needs are discussed. [West J Emerg Med 2011; XX(X)XX-XX].

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Family of bullied teen who died after student punched him reaches historic $27 million settlement, lawyers say

The family of a 13-year-old boy who died after two of his classmates attacked him at lunch will receive a $27 million settlement from a Southern California school district, according to the family's attorneys, who said it is the largest school bullying settlement in U.S. history.

Juana and Felipe Salcedo, the guardians of Diego Stolz, sued the Moreno Valley Unified School District after he died in September 2019, claiming officials ignored several complaints they made in 2018 and 2019 to administrators at Landmark Middle School that Diego was being bullied. They became his guardians after both of his parents died.

The case was settled Wednesday.

"This lawsuit has put schools on notice to find ways to effectively deal with bullying and to enact real anti-bullying policies," attorney Neil Gehlawat said in a statement . "Although his family’s grief can never be taken away, we believe real change will come and there will be a renewed focus on anti-bullying programs across the nation."

A district spokesperson had no comment for the media.

Diego died nine days after a student sucker-punched him at lunch, attorneys Gehlawat and Dave Ring said in a news release . He fell and hit his head on a concrete pillar. Another student punched him in the face while he was on the ground, they said.

Cellphone video released by the attorneys showed Diego standing with his hands at his side. The family's attorneys said that was a "clear indication that he did not want to fight, and would not escalate the situation." A boy is seen in the video swinging at Diego. A second boy also swings and punches him in the head, causing him to fall. The first boy then rushes toward Diego and hits him again, the video shows.

Diego was rushed to a hospital for a traumatic brain injury and placed on life support, the attorneys said. He never regained consciousness, and he died Sept. 25, 2019.

The two teenagers involved, who were 14 at the time, entered the equivalent of guilty pleas in juvenile court to involuntary manslaughter and assault with force likely to cause great bodily injury, The Associated Press reported. They spent 47 days in juvenile custody and were ordered to undergo anger management therapy.

Diego’s guardians say the fatal encounter wasn't the first time he had been bullied. On Sept. 12, 2019, he went to his science teacher for help after he was sucker-punched in the head, the news release says.

"The teacher informed the Assistant Principal that day; she claimed she would review the security footage to find the perpetrators, but she did not," the family's attorneys said.

The next day, the Salcedos' adult daughter went with Diego to speak with the assistant principal. The assistant principal told her that she knew who the alleged bullies were and that the students would be suspended, according to the news release. The assistant principal also said she would switch around class schedules so Diego would not have classes with the bullies, but she never did, the attorneys said.

The family alleged in the lawsuit that the district has "a long history" of failing to protect students who are being bullied. They also said the district failed to enact effective safety procedures to protect the students.

School district Superintendent Martinrex Kedziora said in a letter to parents Wednesday that the district has made several changes regarding anti-bullying since Diego's death. Some of the changes include "a district-wide centralized online bullying form" and classroom posters that define bullying and how to report bullying, Kedziora said.

"On behalf of the Moreno Valley Unified School District Board of Education, we want you to know that we truly care about each and every student and staff member in our district. The news of Diego’s death was not something we took lightly. The safety and well-being of our students will remain our top priority," Kedziora continued.

The family will "forever be heartbroken" by Diego’s death but hopes his story "brings about change in school districts across the country," their attorney said.

Minyvonne Burke is a senior breaking news reporter for NBC News.

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Teenager Hannah Smith killed herself because of online bullying, says father

The father of a teenage girl who killed herself after being abused by bullies on a social networking site has called for it to be closed down.

Dave Smith said his daughter, Hannah, 14, died on Friday in Lutterworth, Leicestershire, after being "cyberbullied" on the question-and-answer website ask.fm, which allows users to send messages without their identity being disclosed.

He is urging the authorities to close down the site, and those like it, after stumbling across cruel taunts from "trolls" that he said drove his daughter to take her own life.

"How many more teenagers will kill themselves because of online abuse before something is done? These sick people are just able to go online and hide behind a mask of anonymity while they abuse vulnerable teenagers," he told the Daily Mirror.

"We've lost Hannah in the most horrendous way imaginable. It's time something was done so that no other family has to go through this."

He urged parents not to allow their children to use the website.

The schoolgirl was found hanged in her bedroom by her sister, Jo, 16. Smith later found a note written by Hannah which read: "I wonder if it's ever going to get better," the Mirror reported.

Stepmother Deborah Smith said Hannah had shown no signs of the torment she was suffering.

"Hannah was bubbly, bright, cheerful and never had a glum face, " she told the Mirror. "There was no warning."

Although people wanting to use ask.fm have to register an email address, name and date of birth, those posting messages can choose to do so anonymously.

Hannah's death echoes that of Jessica Laney, 16, who was found dead at her home in Florida in December after users on social networking sites tormented her with insults and asked: "Can you kill yourself already?"

Laura Mckay, from Skipton, writing on the Change.org petition set up in Jessica's memory, said: "I've been bullied on ask.fm and been told to kill myself many times. It's easy for people to hide behind and bully and it needs to be stopped."

Sharon Sully, from Cumbria, added: "How many more young lives have to be lost before it's [ask.fm] closed down?"

Philip Parsons, from Southport, wrote: "When does the freedom of the internet become a cancer that destroys lives? Websites like this need to be taken down immediately. The governments need to get serious about the cyberbullying issues across the globe. RIP."

Another petition calls for greater measures to tackle websites like ask.fm.

It states: "Cyberbullying has been an ever-increasing problem within the UK for a considerable amount of time with one of the biggest offenders becoming ask.fm, a site popular amongst young people where posts can be made with confidence anonymously which has led to bullying, mental health problems and suicides as well as grooming.

"The problem cannot be allowed to persist and whilst there is public opinion about digital rights please sign if you would like the government to step in and insist that ask.fm and similar sites help us protect our young people. They are able to join from the age of 13 and can post anonymously. There is no option to block other users and only a basic 'report' button."

Emma-Jane Cross, from the campaign group BeatBullying, said: "High-profile cases of trolling over the last week have deservedly received lots of attention in the media.

"However, we also cannot forget that thousands of young people, as in the tragic case of Hannah Smith, face a daily barrage of online abuse, death threats and harassment.

"Although they may not be in the public eye or have celebrity status, it's shocking that one in three young people are cyberbullied, and one in 13 face persistent abuse online.

"We cannot stand by while innocent children lose their lives. Adults need to set an example for young people and we all have a responsibility to tackle this type of behaviour and keep our children safe.

"We want internet service providers, schools, government and the police to come together and produce a UK anti-bullying strategy, to prove that this kind of behaviour will not be tolerated.

"We'd also urge any young person worried about cyberbullying to visit BeatBullying.org for advice and support."

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Persisting Menace: A Case-Based Study of Remote Workplace Bullying in India

• Original Article
• Published: 19 December 2022

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• Satyalakshmi Kompella   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-7453-1849 1  

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Workplace bullying refers to the aggressive behavior and mistreatment towards an employee from peers and/or superiors. When this behavior takes place frequently and for long duration, it causes a high level of stress in the employee, in turn causing direct and indirect damage to the organization. The COVID-19 pandemic precipitated a massive shift from the physical office environment to the work-from-home situation. As the face-to-face interactions between the employees were replaced by video conferencing and other technology-induced interactions, it was expected that the problem of workplace bullying will disappear or will be reduced to a great extent. Instead, the incidents of harassment by colleagues and superiors continue to be reported by employees who are working from home. Organizations are most likely to continue with the work-from-home arrangements even after the easing of the pandemic situation. In this likelihood, developing a comprehensive understanding of bullying in the remote workplace assumes vital significance. The paper uses the case study approach to explore the elements involved in the bullying of remote employees. Analysis of remote bullying incidents from various perspectives revealed that the harassment experienced by the employees in the remote workplace displays all the elements of workplace bullying. Research on the concept and manifestation of remote bullying is in a nascent stage. The study holds significant implications for policymakers and organizations.

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Introduction

Globally, millions of workers were asked to work from home due to the lockdown conditions in the wake of the COVID-19 epidemic. Once the epidemic abates and the situation returns to almost normal, employees may return to the physical workplace, but some employees may continue to work in the remote environment. In their 2020 global survey report titled “Reworking Work: Understanding the Rise of Work Anywhere,” Atlassian Corporation reported that 66% of the Indian workforce wanted to continue working from home, higher than all the countries in the survey (Most Indian prefer to work remotely, 2021 ). Reports from the US National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) and other surveys reveal that the post-COVID scenario may see more employees continuing in the work-from-home mode than before.

Some companies may resort to a hybrid model where some jobs are permanently assigned to work-from-home mode. Indian technology giant, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), has developed a risk assessment model termed “Intelligent Urban Exchange,” to determine the modalities of a possible hybrid model. So, it can be concluded that the option of working from home will continue for selected employees in selected organizations in the post-pandemic situation. In this regard, awareness of the impact of remote bullying is of great significance. Understanding the forms of remote bullying and its impact on the employees’ productivity and stress level, often leading to the decision to exit from employment, is of special interest to organizations and human resource managers. Workplace bullying has been found to be prevalent in all organizations, regardless of level and sector. According to a survey conducted in 2019, more than 50% of the employees in India have reported that they have experienced bullying at the workplace in some form or the other (55% Indian employees bullied at work, 2020 ). Many researchers have studied the forms of bullying, the causes, and its effects and have suggested measures for the prevention of bullying in the workplace. With the shift of workplace from physical offices to remote locations after the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, it was initially considered to be advantageous to the employees as they could spend more time with families (Purwanto et al.,  2020 ). Incidences of bullying were found to be more pervasive in “collated teams” (Flanigan,  2020 ). The absence of collocated teams in the post-pandemic situation was expected to minimize the risk of harassment from colleagues and managers. Moreover, the employees were experiencing the safety of home. Instead, the incidence of bullying continues to be reported from work-from-home situations, and this type of bullying has been found to adopt various forms that are different from those seen in face-to-face bullying and bullying in a group.

The effects of this type of bullying are no less devastating than the bullying in a physical workplace. Remedial actions also suffer from the lack of clear policy guidelines by organizations on harassment of employees working from home. The incidents of workplace bullying in a physical workplace have been shown to have a direct relationship with the decision to leave the job (Djurkovic et al.,  2003 ; Hoel et al.,  2020 ; Yom et al.,  2017a , b ). This study probes into the effect of workplace bullying on job stress and the job retention decisions of employees working from home. This study is based on case studies that describe the workplace bullying experienced by employees who are working from home, and these cases have been collated after several months of observation and discussion.

Few studies are available on the impact and incidence of bullying behavior among employees operating in a remote environment. Ezerins and Ludwig ( 2021 ) reported that organizational behavior management (OBM) strategies may provide additional insight for developing sustainable ifound to be beneficial to organizationsnterventions for workplace incivility. A study conducted in Spain and Germany showed that workplace cyberbullying (WCB) can have a more detrimental impact on victims’ mental health than traditional face-to-face bullying (Czakert et al.,  2021 ). To understand the effect of bullying on the performance of remote workers, the impact of bullying on employees in the physical workplace can be considered the benchmark. Parallels can also be drawn between the negative impact of cyber aggression and cyberbullying on children and adults (Craig et al.,  2020 ; Uludasdemir & Kucuk,  2019 ). As the remote workers are connected to the teams and managers through the networks, the bullying experienced by these workers may be a form of cyberbullying albeit in a workplace context.

The purpose of this study is to contribute to the nascent body of literature on the impact of bullying in remote environments by drawing from the literature on bullying in the workplace and the phenomenon of cyberbullying. The study has two objectives:

To determine if the harassment of employees working from home can be termed bullying and

To build-up an assessment model that incorporates the modalities of the virtual workplace into the basic aspects of bullying in the workplace.

The distinguishing characteristics of the remote workers and the tools of communication used to accomplish the given tasks are taken into consideration to provide a comprehensive picture of bullying in the remote environment.

This study covers two forms of virtual bullying: one involves the display of unprofessional and inappropriate behavior towards the female employee, and the other is undermining the relevance of the employee. The study uses case studies where the recipients of bullying reported it directly to the reporting managers, who are the aggressors. Analysis of the case events was performed to draw parallels between bullying in physical and virtual environments (Table 1 ).

The introduction is followed by a review of the literature. The methodology followed in the study is detailed in the third section followed by results and discussions. Limitations and scope for further research are explained in the last section.

Literature Review

Workplace bullying in the physical workplace.

Bullying (or mobbing) is a situation where “an employee is persistently subjected to negative and aggressive behaviors at work, mainly of a psychological nature. The employee is constantly teased, badgered, and insulted, and perceives that he or she has little recourse to retaliate in kind” (Einarsen,  2000 , p 381). The characteristics of workplace bullying are displayed in Table 2 .

As pointed out by Einarsen et al. ( 2009 ), bullying can involve aggression and mistreatment from colleagues (horizontal bullying), from managers (downward bullying), or from subordinates (upward bullying). When a single act of the above behavior is directed against a particular employee, the behavior may be termed as “unruly.” They are considered as minor issues or of some nuisance value and are generally handled in the context of organizational culture.

When these unruly acts are repeatedly targeted against the employee(s) for a long period of time, the recipient employee(s) feel(s) extreme stress (Palinkas et al, 2015 ). To be classified as bullying, the workplace aggressions should be frequent and persistent (Einarsen et al., 2000 ).

The bullied employee displays work-related behaviors like burnout, absenteeism, and low morale, often leading to resignations. Employees who experience bullying also display health-related, psychological, and affective problems (Bartlett & Bartlett,  2011 ). When employees of a workplace are subjected to bullying, the organization also faces adverse effects. Incidents of bullying negatively impact the organization in terms of productivity, costs, culture, and legal and reputation damages (Einarsen et al.,  2009 ).

Effects of Bullying in the Workplace

Significant research on workplace bullying can be found in studies by Leymann ( 1996 ) and Liefooghe and Olafsson ( 1999 ) based on Scandinavian, German, and European populations. Workplace bullying causes a high level of stress in the employee, destroying his/her self-confidence and self-esteem (Hsu et al, 2019 ). The bullying experiences frequently result in the employees questioning their own self-worth and losing confidence (Conway et al.,  2021 ). Employees also adopt passive coping strategies in response to workplace mistreatment, like using employee silence (Rai & Agarwal,  2018 ). The victim of bullying displays deliberate or unintentional withholding of crucial and general information from the organization. This is referred to as “employee silence,” and it is shown to hamper the functioning of the concerned team or the department (Rai & Agarwal,  2018 ).

The Remote Workplace

The term “remote workplace” refers to the work environment in which the employees work outside of a traditional office environment. These employees are not required to report to a specific, physical space on a regular basis to get their work done. Various terms like “working from home” (Waizenegger et al.,  2020 ), “distributed workplace” (Ruhleder & Jordan,  2001 ), and “location-independent workplace” (Nash,  2019 ) have been used in the previous studies to indicate the remote environment and will be used synonymously in this article. Prior to the pandemic-induced changes, “co-located” workplaces were the preferred workplace arrangements where employees worked side by side.

Individuals working from home are not a recent phenomenon or a pandemic-induced new work adaptation, as there have been instances of employees working from home during the early 1900s. The concept became popular with improved work arrangements, aided by changes in technology. In their article “Two cheers for the virtual office,” Davenport and Pearlson ( 1998 ) attributed the advent of technology to the adoption of remote working as a way of getting work done. Work-from-home arrangements benefit employers in terms of direct cost savings by way of reduced or no maintenance of office premises and indirect cost savings like reduced turnover associated with increased employee satisfaction (Dutcher & Saral,  2012 ). Employing virtual teams is found to be beneficial to organizations in terms of accessing talented employees from all around the globe without the constraints of place and time (Treinen & Miller-Frost,  2006 ).

The COVID-19 pandemic and the need for social distancing meant that organizations had to look for alternative workplaces as employees could not operate from offices. This gave rise to a remote working arrangement or work from home (WFH), which enabled businesses to perform most of the activities using mobile or other digital platforms (Kaushik & Guleria,  2020 ). Remote working was not a preference or a choice for the employees but a compulsion, irrespective of the nature of the job or their abilities. Employees working from home had to adapt quickly to the situation while continuing to perform their designated roles (Dubey & Tripathi,  2020 ).

Face-to-face interaction with peers, supervisors, and top executives was replaced by mediated communication or interaction through technology. Interactions, both brief and extended, were taking place using ICT tools (Swain et al, 2020 ). It has been shown that such technology-mediated interactions are often responsible for conflicts based on esteem, control, and affiliation (relational conflicts) among employees (Salonen,  2017 ).

Since organizations had to quickly create an effective remote work environment due to the March 2020 declaration of lockdown in India, employees had to effect the transformation from a co-located environment to a remote environment with very little or no training. This has put pressure on employees to acclimate to the new communication methods and achieve effective communication (Irawanto et al.,  2021 ).

The Physical Workplace vs. the Remote Workplace

Before initiating the discussion on bullying in the remote workplace, it is necessary to understand the essential differences between the physical and remote workplaces in terms of usage of digital tools, management, communication, and productivity (Stich,  2020 ). The physical workplace helps develop camaraderie between employees through casual and official interactions and helps build organizational culture. The creation of trust, collaboration, and communication can be established in the physical workplace (Barbosa & Ferreira-Lopes,  2021 ). However, this work environment also suffers from the possibility of pseudo-productive work accomplishment (Sundin,  2010 ). The remote workplace, on the other hand, has been shown to promote flexibility, adaptability, and problem-solving (Janene-Nelson & Sutherland,  2020 ) (see Table 3 ).

Workplace Cyberbullying

The term “workplace cyberbullying” refers to the situation where employees are subjected to bullying by their colleagues, not face-to-face but through the information and communications technology (ICT) medium (Loh & Snyman,  2020 ). Employees may be victimized by cyberbullying during and/or after work hours (Keskin et al.,  2016 ). Cyberbullying involves aggressive and uncivil behavior by the aggressor in the form of comments or the posting of pictures against the targeted employee via phone messages, emails, websites, and social media posts (Cassidy et al., 2018 ). This type of bullying enables the aggressor to remain anonymous while making the comments or while replying to posts (Kamara, 2020 ). The employees in the physical workplace are subjected to cyberbullying, which may occur as a standalone incident or in tandem with traditional bullying.

When cyberbullying is characterized by repetitive acts of aggressive behavior and happens between two individuals with a power imbalance, it is seen that the victim is under a great deal of stress, ultimately impacting the employee’s performance in the workplace (Zhang et al.,  2021 ). Workplace cyberbullying has been shown to be conceptually similar to traditional face-to-face bullying in the physical workplace (Farley et al.,  2016 ).

Knowledge about cyberbullying becomes crucial for the present study as the bullying in the remote workplace shares some similarities with cyberbullying (Wang et al, 2019 ). The occurrence of both of these acts is aided by the medium of ICT, which is the channel where cyberbullying takes place (Willard, 2006 , 2007 ). The remote workplace also involves ICT tools, as face-to-face interactions are vastly minimized in the remote workplace and communication is mediated through the tools of ICT. Also, bullying can take place anywhere and at any time in both of these forms of bullying, bridging the gaps of time and space divides (D’Cruz & Noronha,  2018a , b ).

On the other hand, cyberbullying differs from bullying in the remote workplace in the degree of anonymity that is available to the cyberbully while committing the acts of bullying. Cyberbullies largely remain anonymous on various platforms, and that is the reason why anonymity has been associated with higher rates of bullying (Szczyglowski,  2018 ). However, when bullying occurs in a remote workplace, the bully(ies) can be seen and heard and are clearly identifiable. Another difference is that cyberbullying facilitates the sustenance and escalation of the bullying episodes through the multiple likes and shares available on the social media platforms, whereas in the case of the remote workplace, the bullying episodes remain within the team (Chan et al.,  2020 ; Privitera & Campbell,  2009 ).

Bullying in the Remote Workplace

The COVID-19 pandemic has necessitated the transformation of physical workplaces into remote workplaces. During the pandemic, remote working was not a preference or a choice for the employees but a compulsion, irrespective of the nature of the job or their abilities.

Face-to-face interactions in the physical workplace or co-presence with the team members and managers promote workplace culture and help make sense of the employees’ emotions, body language, and embodied experiences. The communication through virtual channels is different and novel for the work-from-home employees due to the absence of face-to-face interactions (Howard-Grenville,  2020 ). All these factors culminate in the remote employees’ sense of psychological stress due to the distance, reliance, and technology (Flanigan,  2020 ). A survey by McKinsey and Company indicated that the unprecedented move to WFH and subsequent recurring waves of occurrence of the infection have caused anxiety and work and performance-related stress in the remote workers (The future of work after COVID-19,  2021 ).

Anxiety about the future and stress arising out of remote work have been shown to be strongly associated with bullying at the workplace (Feijó et al.,  2019 ). In view of these findings, the susceptibility of the remote workers to bullying from peers and managers needs to be studied. Very few studies are available on the incidence and effects of bullying among employees in remote environments. There are some studies that have probed into the impact of bullying on virtual workers (Mortensen & Hinds, 2001 ). A dissertation conducted on virtual workers divulged that they are at risk of workplace bullying and that the effects of bullying are in accordance with the physical, psychological, and social effects found in several studies regarding collocated workers. Findings also reveal that the nature of virtual work can increase the likelihood of bullying among these workers (Flanigan,  2020 ). In her book on “Online bullying of workers,” D’Cruz ( 2016 ) has observed that online bullying of workers is a widespread problem and is expected to increase considerably in the future.

The present study focuses on the Indian employees who are presently working from home since the declaration of lockdown in 2020. Before this period, these employees were mostly co-located and worked from the office environment. The study combines aspects of the extant literature on bullying in the workplace and cyberbullying to probe into the phenomenon of bullying among employees working from home.

Methodology

The method adopted for this study is qualitative research with an exploratory approach. The flexibility afforded by this method helped in developing an understanding of the phenomenon under study (Ponelis,  2015 ). This method allowed the author to find answers to the questions involving the causes of workplace bullying in a remote work environment, how this has developed, and why it exists. This method helped establish credibility regarding the existence of the phenomenon of workplace bullying in a work-from-home situation. No empirical data was collected, as the objective of the study was not to generalize across the entire working population who are working from home.

Research Design

The research design adopted for this study was the case study approach. Two case studies that reflect the scope and seriousness of the issues faced by working professionals presently working from home since the announcement of lockdown in India were used to illustrate the phenomenon of workplace bullying. The case study approach is appropriate for this paper as it allows the researcher to identify and understand the reasons for the existence of bullying in remote environments using probing and in-depth interviews. The paper used a case study approach to identify the nature and causes of workplace bullying. Though qualitative research results cannot be applied to the entire population (as no testing of hypotheses is performed), they helped in providing a thorough understanding of the phenomenon. This understanding would be helpful for organizational leaders to take appropriate corrective and preventive measures.

The present study used purposeful sampling to identify and select individuals who have experienced some form of workplace bullying in a traditional or remote work environment. Purposeful sampling is a technique widely used in qualitative research for the identification and selection of information-rich cases for the most effective use of limited resources (Yin,  2014a ). Additionally, only those individuals who were available and willing to participate in the research and could communicate their experiences and opinions in a clear and concise manner were considered.

The profiles of working individuals were sourced from the author’s connections at LinkedIn, the online social network. A short message requesting participation was posted to their links, and it was stressed that participation was purely voluntary. The message also briefly outlined the details of the intended study. It was reiterated that the information was being collected for academic purposes only. A short questionnaire was sent to those individuals who responded positively to this message. Based on the request of the respondents, the questionnaires were sent to their personal email ids. The aim of the questionnaire was to determine if they had been subject to any form of harassment while working from home or if they knew of or had observed any instance of harassment happening to others (see Appendix for the questionnaire).

The questionnaire first ascertained if the respondents were working from home. Any replies that indicated that the respondents were no longer working or taking a sabbatical were not considered for the study. The age and gender of the respondents, along with the sector of work, were also elicited through the questions.

The questionnaire was aimed at examining whether the respondents were subjected to any bullying in the workplace or not. The questions were designed to elicit information on the details of bullying that the respondent was subjected to (if any). “Are you bullied at work?” helped reveal if the respondents were bullied. Those respondents who reported some forms of bullying were considered for further study. Those who did not report any bullying behavior were asked not to continue with the questionnaire. The question “When did the bullying start?” helped identify whether the bullying incidents were recent or not. It was noted that all bullying incidents were recent and started between less than a month ago and 3 months before the respondents were contacted by the author.

The respondents were asked to identify the bully to understand if the bullying was perpetrated by managers, colleagues, or subordinates of others. All bullying was reported to be perpetrated by managers, and no bullying was reported from colleagues, subordinates, or others.

Sometimes, the employee may or may not be subjected to bullying but may witness others being bullied. This information was also elicited through the question, “Have you witnessed bullying at work?”.

The question “Number of people bullied” probed into whether bullying was experienced by other employees or not. Both of these questions were answered mostly in the negative by the respondents. This response could be attributed to the fact that employees were working from home and had no opportunity to observe other employees and their interactions with the managers. Details of responses to the questions from the questionnaire are presented in Table 1 .

The respondents were also asked to share the questionnaire with their colleagues, friends, or family members who were working from home. This modified form of “snowball sampling” was used to generate as many leads as possible and identify the incidence of bullying. This method of sample collection was the most effective option for collecting information as the employees were functioning in a remote work environment. Unlike the traditional office work environment, where a large group of employees was available in a single location, the present group of employees was geographically scattered.

Most individuals prefer to ignore instances of harassment or bullying for fear of exposure or ridicule and are apt to reveal details of any harassment only under the condition of anonymity. In this paper, all the respondents answered the questionnaire on the condition of anonymity. The original list of 19 respondents contained LinkedIn profiles of connections who reported to be working from home since the commencement of national lockdown in March 2020. Each of them was asked to pass on the questionnaire to their contacts who were bullied or had seen bullying around them. The responses received from sharing the questionnaire varied from a minimum of 2 per respondent to a maximum of 6 per respondent. After rejecting incomplete responses, 48 final responses were obtained, where most of them stated that they were subjected to some form of bullying or that they were aware of some cases of bullying happening to their acquaintances. These responses were considered for further investigation.

A short email was sent to all 48 individuals, in which they were assured of the complete anonymity of their replies. To obtain relevant information from the respondents, prolonged communication between the respondents and the author was undertaken. Frank and accurate information was needed from the respondents to potentially searching and in-depth questions. The respondents were made aware of these requirements and were asked to email their responses.

Two respondents were zeroed in for in-depth study after they consented to answering further queries. Both victims were female and had worked in the offices before the lockdown. They have been working from home since March 2020. The aggressors were female in case 1 and male in case 2. Both were reporting managers, and the victims were reporting directly to them (see Table 4 ). Case study building was done using extensive interviews and individual narratives.

The interviews included question and answer sessions, reports, and discussions on workplace incidents that involved bullying behaviors and the victims’ reactions and thought processes. Due care was taken by the author in wording the probing questions. The words “bullying” or “negative action incidents” were used to describe the bullying actions. The words “perpetrator,” “aggressor,” or “bully” were used to describe the perpetrators. The respondents were also advised to use these words while describing the incidents. Words like “harassment,” “sexual harassment,” and “abuse” were completely avoided by the author in the emails. This was done to ensure that only bullying experiences were described by the respondents and that any other negative experiences outside the category of bullying were kept out of the study. The initial communication between the victims (or respondents) and the author was meant for confidence-building and to develop an understanding of the nature of aggression experienced by the respondents. By the time the victims were approached by the author, they had already been facing the bullying experiences for some time and had expressed their opinions clearly. Victims’ narratives of the aggressive behavior directed towards them helped the author ascertain whether the victims were subjected to person-related bullying, work-related bullying, or intimidation towards a person (Erwandi et al., 2021 ).

A considerable number of emails were exchanged to ascertain whether the respondents were indeed facing bullying behaviors or not. It was clarified from both respondents that.

They were at the receiving end of negative actions from one or more individuals.

The individual who was subjecting them to negative actions was a manager, colleague, or subordinate.

They (the respondents) were unable to defend themselves against those negative actions perpetrated against them.

The negative actions were not one-off incidents but occurred with a frequency of more than once a week (Erwandi et al., 2021 ).

At the beginning of the communication with the author, the respondents were merely responding to questions and were not offering any additional information regarding their experiences at the workplace. It took some time and an exchange of emails before both started speaking freely regarding the bullying experiences. Details of bullying behavior were elicited through questions with emphasis on the bully’s actions, the respondents’ handling of the situation, and the respondents’ state of mind. Emphasis was laid on the respondents’ feelings, reactions, and thought processes during the bullying episodes.

In the communication with the author, both victims were sure that they were unfairly subjected to aggressive treatment from their superiors, and as a result, they were agitated and experienced a state of stress. Bullying-related stress is common in employees who are subject to workplace bullying (Reknes et al., 2021 ). The victims clearly described the actions of the managers and how these behaviors impacted their performance and undermined their confidence and self-esteem. The victims noted that organizational mediation or escalation was not forthcoming to handle the bullying.

The communication with the victims ended after their decision to quit their respective organizations. In their final communications, the victims noted that they could have continued in the organization if a supportive organizational climate had been provided where they were safe from bullying. The interviews with the respondents started in August 2020 and continued till May 2021. A total of 172 and 220 emails were exchanged between the author and respondents of cases 1 and 2, respectively. Around 492 email transcript pages were analyzed to gather relevant information. Two emails were exchanged with the HR manager in case 1 respondent’s organization. The other HR in case 2 did not respond to the author’s emails.

Case Study 1: Experiences of an Employee with the Reporting Manager Undermining the Relevance of the Employee

The respondent in the case study is an executive with an edutech company. We will call her K. She is 36 years old and is presently head of an 8-member sales team. Her team is involved in scrutinizing the requirements of non-corporate clients and providing the details for customizing the products as per the client’s needs. These details are passed on to the delivery team. K reports to the product manager, A, who handles the leads team, delivery teams, and K’s team.

K was previously reporting to another product manager in the pre-COVID period. Since the initiation of work from home, K has been reporting to A. K has met A previously during the office work meetings, but this is the first time that she is reporting to A. K was confident that she would be able to work with A and anticipated no problems. But 4 weeks after the start of work from home, the bullying began.

It started with Zoom meetings. A wanted to be present in all Zoom meetings, whether it was with team members, the leads team, or the operations team. She also wanted to be sent the Zoom link for meetings that K scheduled with clients. A also insisted that her credentials should be mentioned in K’s introduction talk. These actions caused K a great deal of agitation and annoyance.

“Her presence was unnecessary for these meetings, and I felt I was under scrutiny throughout. Also, her presence was creating confusion in the minds of the clients and some team members. I was also not sure if she would silently participate in the meetings and listen to the proceedings or suddenly pitch in with clarifications or observations. This was really stressing me.”

Some clients asked K if they should address further correspondence to A, as she was the senior person. K felt that A had no confidence in her work and was looking to find faults in the way she managed her team and clients. But she did not take up the issue with A; she felt the matter would smooth out on its own in due time.

But matters escalated, and the bullying extended into real-time work monitoring. K’s team was a mix of experienced and newly hired employees. So, K, as an experienced team leader, monitored the newcomers much more closely than the others. K said,

“I knew the capabilities and issues with the older team members. If the work was being done on time, I did not interfere much.”

This was not acceptable to A. She instructed K to monitor the team much more closely and not let any slack in the team’s functioning. One of the team members, P, was having some domestic issues and wanted to report late to work for a week. He was good at his work, and he made up for lost time by foregoing his breaks or extending the work sessions. He explained his situation to K and pleaded for some relaxation during his work hours. K had no issues with this arrangement as P was an important member of the team. However, A made it a point to mention the issue of P’s late reporting at the weekly review and sent emails to all the team members, cautioning them not to follow in P’s footsteps.

“She was undermining my leadership and team handling. I was unable to function properly and was always conscious of being under watch.”

The breaking point was reached when A forwarded these emails to the department head and showcased them as K’s inability to deal with the team. A reported that K was not satisfactory as the team lead and failed to impose discipline and control on the team. The department head asked K for an explanation. K was devastated.

“What do I do now? If I bring in charges of bullying against A, it will seem as if I am offering excuses.”

In her most recent communication with the author, K confided that she had resigned and was presently working out her notice period.

Case Study 2: Experiences of a Gaming Industry Employee with the Manager-Unprofessional Conduct During Videoconferencing

The second case concerns an individual who is an employee of a gaming firm. She will be referred to as M. She takes care of weapon design in a warfare game, and she has been working in the gaming industry for the last 6 months. Before the announcement of lockdown in March 2020, M was working with the entire team on the night shift. After the lockdown, she started working from home with the same timings. Initially, M was very happy with the remote work situation. She had a toddler at home, and she felt she could spend more time with her child.

M’s discomfort began with the daily review meeting with her manager (who will be hereafter referred to as S). The review meetings were scheduled for the end of the day ostensibly to review the work completed in the day. M was working the night shift (1 PM to 10 PM). So daily report meetings inevitably took place after 10 p.m.

M realized that something was wrong when S showed up for the meeting 1 day with his shirt buttons undone and went shirtless the next day. She tried to keep the meeting short and kept her eyes on the notes.

“I was embarrassed at first, and I was not very familiar with the remote working protocol. I thought the manager was also confused about the protocol. But within a short time, I understood that something was not right.”

S continued to remain casually dressed during the Zoom meetings, and his remarks started becoming personal.

“At first, he asked me about work and how I responded to emails from the testing team. But slowly, he started making personal comments. He would ask me if I were in my nightdress. He would invariably make a comment on my appearance. In another instance, he asked me if I was working from the bedroom.”

M was not only uncomfortable but also felt stressed due to the harassment. She started dreading the review meetings and often made excuses to avoid them.

“I used to send a message citing a power cut or faulty Wi-Fi connection and get out of the meeting. My stress levels were very high. My personal life was also getting affected due to this harassment. My husband could sense that something was wrong.”

But M was not comfortable sharing any of these misbehaviors with her colleagues or her family members.

“I don’t want to bring in an escalation regarding the manager’s behavior with the HR. I feel that I will be seen as a provocative person.”

The breaking point was reached when S chaired a review meeting and was visibly drunk. He made several remarks about M’s personal appearance and her relationship with him. M was shocked at his appearance and behavior. She decided to report S’s behavior to the HR. Her emails to HR elicited no response.

“I called the HR manager personally and explained the incidents. There was a long pause after my narration. The HR manager said he would get back to me shortly. He has not done so. I decided to end this harassment by resigning.”

Both cases demonstrate bullying of employees by reporting managers in workplace situations and show discriminating behavior adopted by managers towards the subordinates. Analysis of the incidents and other information revealed that they fall within the parameters of workplace bullying and four different concepts related to workplace bullying in a remote environment. The case studies revealed the four components: negative behavior of the perpetrator, power imbalance between the bullying victim and perpetrator, duration and frequency of persistent negative behaviors of the perpetrator, and negative impacts of bullying on the victim (Einarsen et al.,  2009 ; Lee et al.,  2014 ; Medina et al.,  2020 ; Salin,  2021 ).

Negative Behavior of Perpetrator

This component of bullying involves a personal attack on the victim by the perpetrator, erosion of the victim’s professional competence and reputation, and attack through work roles and tasks. These acts are done with the intention to harm, control, or manipulate the victim. Perpetrators of bullying deliberately target other people, undermining their self-esteem and their work, and their acts are deliberate, not accidental (Saunders,  2007 ). Targets of workplace bullying can feel humiliated, ashamed, upset, anxious, and depressed.

In case 1, the perpetrator reported that she found the victim “not satisfactory as the team lead.” Prior to this comment, there is evidence that the perpetrator has deliberately tried to undermine the confidence and self-esteem of the victim. The victim was subjected to unwanted scrutiny and supervision during meetings with clients and team members. The victim’s authority was being undermined as a reporting authority with clients. Her role as a team leader was also under threat as the perpetrator was questioning the way K dealt with her team members in matters of attendance and performance. There was no evidence that K failed in team management or client handling, but A was undermining K’s role as a team leader with negative behavior.

Making insulting or offensive remarks about a person, attitudes or private life is considered a part of person-related bullying activity (Einarsen et al.,  2009 ). Studies on workplace bullying have shown that unpleasant personal remarks are among the most prevalent bullying behaviors (Tehrani,  2004 ). In case 2, the perpetrator made several personal comments about the victim’s attire and place of work. The professional dress code and professional behavior were not followed by the manager of the victim.

Power Imbalance Between Bullying Victim and Perpetrator

This component is of significance as it provides information about the imbalance of power. The power imbalance exists between the aggressor and the victim, where both are at different levels of the organizational hierarchical structure with well-defined reporting structures. The imbalance of power is central to the bullying episodes and the entire concept of bullying. Most of the bullying has been reported to be perpetrated by a person in the higher authority in the organizational structure towards someone at the lower end of the structure (Branch et al., 2013 ). The power gap limits the victim’s capability to resist, defend, or effectively cope with the bullying behaviors (Zapf & Einarsen,  2001 ). In both cases, the aggressors or perpetrators were the reporting authority of the victims.

In case 1, the aggressor was the product manager, and the victim was the team lead reporting to the product manager. The victim was the recipient of negative behaviors by the product manager who is her immediate reporting authority. Though she was under stress due to the bullying behaviors, she did not escalate the matter to the higher authorities and did not confront the perpetrator. All of this is characteristic of response to bullying behaviors. As pointed out by Salin ( 2021 ), a power deficit in a professional relationship makes the individual more sensitive to perceived threats and, in turn, may restrict his or her capability to cope and resist the bullying behaviors exhibited by a reporting authority.

In case 2, the aggressor was the team leader, and the victim was his team member, reporting to him. Despite repeated instances of inappropriate remarks about her dress and person, the victim neither shared the experiences with her family nor with the HR personnel. It was only after the situation deteriorated rapidly, the victim tried to escalate the matter. The victim’s reluctance to deal with the bullying in an assertive and timely manner resulted in limited and unsatisfactory results. This kind of reluctant behavior may be attributed to the way employees look at bullying. As pointed out by Tehrani ( 2004 ), bullying is a private event.

Duration and Frequency of Persistent Negative Behaviors of the Perpetrator

Many of the definitions of workplace bullying include the criterion that a behavior cannot be a standalone event. Bullying must occur more than once and must be experienced by the target on a frequent and persistent basis (Einarsen et al.,  2009 ).

In other words, the occurrence of persistent negative behavior once or twice every week for a period of 6 to 12 months and further is mandatory for the behavior to be labeled as bullying (Nielsen & Einarsen,  2012 ). One-off clashes and incidents resulting from workplace incivility and intra-employee conflicts take place routinely at the workplace, but they are not seen to produce long-lasting and severe consequences such as bullying behaviors (Kim et al.,  2019 ).

In both cases described in this paper, it is clear that the behaviors are not one-off clashes and are not spur-of-the-moment events but were reported to be repetitive and frequent. The negative behavior of the perpetrator towards the victim had been happening frequently many times a week. The negative behaviors were present at the time of starting the interviews with the case subjects and continued till the end of the interview (from the first reach out in Aug. 2020 till the last contact in June 2021).

In case 1, the victim experienced repeated instances of fault-finding, undermining the leadership skills, and interference. The incidents began after 1 month of working together and continued for more than 6 months. The victim decided to quit after experiencing various bullying incidents for more than 11 months.

In case 2, the victim reported the occurrence of incidents in June 2020, and they continued till February 2021, for a period of 10 months. The victim experienced incidents of uncalled for personal remarks and intimidating and unprofessional behavior from the reporting officer.

Negative Impacts of Bullying on the Victim

Almost every study on workplace bullying has focused on the effects of bullying on employees (Einarsen et al.,  2020 , p147). Attendance, turnover, and productivity have been shown to be adversely affected by incidents of bullying in the workplace (Einarsen et al.,  2020 ). Earlier studies have also documented the increased utilization of sick leave and the prevalence of suicidal tendencies in bullied employees (Vartia,  2001 ). Bullying behavior has been consistently shown to negatively impact the employee physically, psychologically, and occupationally (Rai & Agarwal,  2018 ; Robert, 2018 ).

In the first case, the victim was experiencing mental stress due to the bullying actions of the manager, and she was being damaged career-wise; she was being portrayed as an inefficient team leader. These kinds of negative comments could have a detrimental effect on the victim’s future career path.

In case 2, the aggressor was causing mental stress to the victim who was deliberately missing meetings with him. The victim also experienced mental anguish due to his unprofessional behavior which created problems between the victim and her family.

In both cases, the victims decided to resign from their job, which is a common result of workplace bullying (Notelaers et al.,  2019 ) (Table 5 ).

The negative consequences of workplace bullying are summarized in eight factors (Medina et al.,  2020 , p 8) as displayed in Table 6 .

The role of the HR departments of both case subjects has been taken into consideration in this study. When contacted by the author, the HR in case 1 revealed that the firm does not have a work-from-home policy document in place and one such is in the pipeline. She, however, denied any knowledge of the issues between the aggressor and the victim. She also revealed that the organization had a Sexual Harassment Cell (SHC) which was constituted in 2019 and it was functional. Regarding the WFH arrangement, the organization issued certain dos and don’ts regarding the log-in and log-out for work and rules regarding data privacy.

The HR manager of the organization in case 2 did not respond to emails from the author. The victim reported that the HR had given a patient hearing regarding her complaints against the manager but failed to take any corrective action.

Considering case 2, the form of bullying faced by the victim is unique in several ways. One is the workplace environment. As a result of the lockdown imposed in India, employees were mandated to work from home. As stated by the HR executive of the organization in case 1, the protocols required to manage the WFH situations were yet to be implemented. It is evident that the victims and their managers are in a new work environment and are in the process of getting oriented to the new way of working and communication. Due to the imposition of the national lockdown, employees had to adapt quickly to WFH, and the identification of obstacles and enablers to employees’ well-being and job performance was a priority for many organizations (Galanti et al.,  2021 ). The HR executive of the organization in case 2 revealed that the WFH guidelines issued to employees included details of log-in and log-out but did not contain any dress code and other guidelines to be adopted during interactions.

The other unique aspect of remote environments is the enabling of face-to-face interactions between the team members and their managers in WFH situations. The one-to-one interaction between employees is mandatory for the purpose of communication or problem-solving, and it enables sharing of personal space between the individuals. Without proper protocols in place, there is a high possibility that the sharing of personal environments could be misused which is evident in case 2.

The present study combines the perspectives of bullying in the physical workplace with that of cyberbullying to understand the concept of bullying in the remote workplace.

One of the contributions of this study is the development of the concept of workplace bullying in a remote environment, especially in the context of employees working from home. Despite the absence of face-to-face interactions and a focus on technology-mediated communication, work-from-home situations were found to be highly susceptible to workplace bullying. This is in accordance with the view that the nature of virtual work increases the likelihood of bullying (Flanigan,  2020 ). Though remote working is linked to improved productivity, job satisfaction, and work engagement, remote workers are likely to be subjected to frequent and relentless bullying at the workplace and face considerable stress (Yom et al.,  2017a ).

The study also revealed that bullying experienced by employees working from home displayed all the characteristics of traditional workplace bullying (Einarsen et al.,  2009 ; Lee et al.,  2014 ).

The employees observed in this study were subject to repeated and persistent negative behaviors that are aggressive or appear to be aggressive to the victim. This is in line with the observed manifestation of traditional workplace bullying (Einarsen et al.,  2020 ; Leymann, 1990 ,  1996 ).

The bullying episodes analyzed in the present study show a clear power imbalance between bullying victim and perpetrator. The victims are at a lower hierarchical level in comparison to the aggressor. The presence of an imbalance in power between the aggressor and the victim has been shown to be crucial to the concept of workplace bullying (Chirilă & Constantin, 2013 ; Einarsen et al.,  2009 ). The power imbalance in workplaces could result due to individual, situational, or societal characteristics (Salin,  2003 ). But the present study involves cases that depict the imbalance of power due to organizational hierarchical structure.

As both victims are women, a tendency to attribute the occurrence of bullying incidents to gender differences does arise. But previous studies on bullying and gender have cautioned not to look for a linear relationship between gender and bullying but rather as a “gendered context” (Salin,  2021 , p 24). More in-depth studies would be needed to study the relationship between bullying tendencies and gender in remote environments.

The negative impacts of bullying are experienced by both employees and the organization. The employee who is the victim experiences psychological and physical health issues, and the organization suffers from employee attrition, along with losses in terms of reputation and legal charges (Srivastava & Agarwal,  2020 ). In case 1, the employee’s capabilities were being questioned and the bullying incidents brought in emotional exhaustion in the employee.

Previous studies have noted that there is a gradual build-up of bullying incidents and victims take time to report (Palmer,  2021 ).

“At first, he asked me about work and how I responded to emails from the testing team. But slowly he started making personal comments.”

The targets of bullying behavior in organizations generally hesitate to complain to the relevant authorities (Palmer,  2021 ). This tendency was observed in the respondents of both cases detailed in this paper.

In the cases presented in the study, both the victims suffered from severe mental stress and were exiting the organization. The organization experienced a loss of a talented workforce.

The study contributes to the study of the remote environment in terms of the parameters used to analyze the effect of bullying. The work-from-home situated mandated due to the COVID-19 situation has blurred the boundaries between home and work, and this has led to changes in work culture (Waizenegger et al.,  2020 ). The assessment incorporated the technology-mediated communication channels and the changes in the work culture that is a part of the work-from-home environment (Karl et al.,  2021 ). The increased use of videoconferencing for communication has provided opportunities for bullying of the employees as seen in case 2. The face-to-face meetings of the traditional workplace have given way to video conferences which have their own set of problems as seen in case 1.

The role of organizations in the management of workplace bullying assumes high significance. Both the organizations featured in the paper had no clear HR policy against bullying. As pointed out by Verma and Barua ( 2021 ), workplace bullying in India is generally actionable under the law only if the bullying behavior is directed against certain vulnerable sections of society or can be classified as abetment to suicide. Noopur and Burman ( 2021 ) noted that the increasing prevalence of work bullying is common in Information Technology (IT) organizations and has a psychological and physical impact on employees; hence, employers must acknowledge and accept the existence of the bullying phenomenon. The Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013, (POSH) is the main policy awarding protection against harassment in the Indian workplace, which the HR experts say needs clarification on its validity in the remote workplace, thus creating a lacuna (Poonia,  2019 ). If the work-from-home situation is likely to continue post-pandemic (even partially), there is a need for a full-fledged policy against workplace bullying in the remote environment from both the government and organizations (Jain,  2018 ).

Limitations and Further Research

The paper suffers from the usual disadvantages that are observed in a case study-based approach to research (Hodkinson & Hodkinson, 2001 ; Zainal,  2007 ). The paper presents only two instances of workplace bullying which cannot be generalized to the entire remote environment in India at present. However, the cases are indicative of the scope and nature of bullying in this environment and offer an opportunity for further investigation into the concept and forms of bullying in the remote workplace.

Further research is required into the phenomenon of bullying in the remote environment in order to obtain an understanding of the elements of abusive supervision (Tepper,  2000 ) on workplace harassment.

As it appears that the work-from-home situation is here to stay, more research needs to be done to understand the scope and forms of bullying that can manifest in a remote workplace. This will help policymakers to create an appropriate regulatory framework for effective and safe workplace creation.

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Appendix. A Study On Workplace Bullying

Thank you for consenting to answer the questionnaire on workplace bullying. The questions elicit responses on various aspects of bullying. The data will be used for academic purposes only, and all the details of the respondent will be kept confidential.

Are you working from home due to COVID-19 lockdown?

Your age (in years)

Your gender

Sector where you are working

Are you bullied at work?

No/Yes, rarely/Yes, often/Yes, everyday/Do not want to answer.

When did the bullying start?

Less than a month ago/Between 1 and 3 months/Between 3 and 6 months/Going on from a long time/Do not remember.

Identity of the bully Manager/colleague/subordinate/other

Number of people bullied

Only me/Me and others/Everybody at work/Did not notice.

Have you witnessed bullying at work? Yes/No/Do not want to answer

Based on your replies, can the author of this questionnaire reach out to you for further questions?

Yes/No (if yes, please provide your email id for further communication).

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Kompella, S. Persisting Menace: A Case-Based Study of Remote Workplace Bullying in India. Int Journal of Bullying Prevention (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42380-022-00152-8

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Bullying case studies

The following case studies provide examples of workplace bullying, its impact on an individual’s health and safety and examples of how employers failed to control the risk.

Workplace bullying is repeated, unreasonable behaviour directed at an employee or group of employees that creates a risk to health and safety.

Bullying of one employee

M started his first job as an apprentice plumber at the age of 16. Two years into his apprenticeship, M made a complaint to WorkSafe about his experiences at work, which included:

• his boss calling him gay and using offensive language towards him
• his boss encouraging other employees to call him names, ask inappropriate questions and make crude insinuations about his personal life
• his boss taking his mobile phone and making him believe he had posted inappropriate comments on a female friend's page
• having a live mouse put down the back of his shirt by another employee
• having his work shorts ripped up by his boss
• having liquid nails squirted into his hair and face by fellow employees
• being beaten with plumbing pipes and having hose connectors thrown at him by his boss and fellow employees
• being spat on by employees
• having a rag doused with methylated spirits held over his mouth by his boss

The impact on M's physical and mental health

For a long time, M felt too afraid of losing his job to complain to his boss about the treatment he was subjected to. However, he eventually became distressed to the point that he was afraid to go to work. He began experiencing nightmares, insomnia, difficulty concentrating, getting angry for no reason, tearfulness, depression, anxiety and stress.

M was eventually diagnosed with a psychological disorder which prevented him from being able to return to work with his employer.

Risk to health and safety

The bullying behaviour that M was subjected to at work impacted his health and safety and resulted in both physical and psychological injury. The employer failed to control that risk as it did not have a bullying policy, and did not provide proper supervision, information, instruction and training to its employees on workplace bullying.

Prosecution outcome

The employer in the actual case was found guilty of offences under the Occupational Health and Safety Act 2004, and was convicted and fined $12,500.

Bullying of multiple employees

S, m, l and j's story.

S, M, L and J were part of a group of employees at a commercial bakery where they were required to perform tasks including baking, sandwich preparation, general food preparation, cleaning and delivery of orders to local businesses.

They alleged they had been subjected to verbal, physical and emotional abuse by their employer over a period of two years. The abuse included:

• being called 'pig', 'porky', 'dog' and other derogatory names by their boss
• being sworn at, with their boss using foul and abusive language
• their boss yelling and grunting at them for no apparent reason
• having items such as sticks thrown at them or at their desks
• their boss threatening them with physical harm, including being attacked by dogs and being dissolved in acid
• having trolleys pushed into the backs of their legs
• being labelled as 'useless' and 'a waste of space' by their boss
• being told by their boss to 'go away and die, and make sure you die quietly'

The impact on the victims' physical and mental health

One of the women reported that as a result of the bullying, she had 'lost my friends, my life, my world and my mind'. Others reported that they suffered mental and physical distress, including depression and exacerbation of other psychological conditions. Some went on to suffer relationship breakdowns.

The treatment S, M, L and J and their colleagues were subjected to at work created a risk to their health and safety and resulted in them suffering both physical and psychological injuries. The employer had no systems or procedures in place to regulate that workplace behaviour and no policies or procedures to educate employees in respect of appropriate workplace behaviour and workplace bullying.

The employer in the actual case was found guilty of offences under the Occupational Health and Safety Act 2004, and was convicted and fined $50,000.

Bullying of an employee by a manager

S is a teacher in the private sector and has 20 years of experience at the school. The school was going through a change management process. S made an application to the Fair Work Commission for an Order to Stop Bullying based on allegation which included:

• The principal, M, allocating a business manager to conduct S's annual review despite the fact that the business manager had not conducted any other teacher's review, had no educational experience and had recently had unpleasant exchanges with S.
• M entered a discussion between S and the pay clerk about S's long service leave request and, standing very close to S with clenched fists, said 'I have not signed off on it. You have to wait.' M was not actually dealing with the leave application.
• On S's return from long service leave, S was directed to complete an induction program for new employees and was appointed a mentor with less experience than she had. S was the only employee to have to do the induction on return from leave and the only employee who was not new to be allocated a mentor.

The impact on S's physical and mental health

As a result of the behaviours, S felt isolated, targeted and demeaned in the workplace. S was also insulted, embarrassed and humiliated by being allocated a mentor and having to do the induction training in spite of her 20 years' experience. S felt so distressed because of the personal behaviour of the principal towards her that S saw her doctor and was given time off work.

The treatment S was subjected to at work impacted on her health and safety and resulted in her suffering a psychological injury. The employer could have prevented this from occurring by:

• ensuring the appropriate person conducted the annual review
• training managers in how to interact professionally with employees
• providing appropriate training to employees based on their experience in the job

Bullying of one employee by multiple colleagues

K was a police officer and was successful in being promoted into a new team. K made a common law claim for damages alleging she suffered injuries as a result of her employer's negligence. The behaviours that led to K suffering a mental injury allegedly included:

• being given the worst desk normally reserved for temporary staff
• being told that her supervisor thought she had slept with the boss to get the job
• after announcing she was pregnant, the supervisor asked her if she had slept with the boss to get the job
• the supervisor calling HR in front of her and asking if she could be replaced because she was pregnant
• the supervisor told K that the only way he could get rid of her was if she voluntarily relinquished the job and asked if she was willing to do so
• being called 'the black widow' by the supervisor when she walked into the room.
• being socially ostracised by the team
• having difficulty getting time off to look after her child post maternity leave when other people had no trouble getting time off to play golf
• not being invited on a social club interstate trip
• being shouted at when she questioned being left out of the social club interstate trip

The impact on K's physical and mental health

K went from being a fit and healthy young woman to being unable to work and suffering from depression, high anxiety and panic attacks.

The treatment that K was subjected to at work impacted on her health and safety and resulted in her suffering a psychological injury. The employer could have prevented this from occurring by:

• ensuring that appropriate supervision was provided under Section 21(2)(e) of the Occupational Health and Safety Act 2004
• providing appropriate training to its managers on how to handle maternity leave arrangements and post-maternity leave return to work
• providing appropriate training to all employees about acceptable workplace behaviour

Employer duties

The Occupational Health and Safety Act 2004 (OHS Act) requires employers to eliminate risks to health and safety, so far as reasonably practicable. If it is not reasonably practicable to eliminate risks, the employer must reduce risks, so far as reasonably practicable.

The best approach to deal with risks to health and safety associated with workplace bullying is to implement appropriate measures in the workplace.

In line with their duty to eliminate and reduce risks to health, including psychological health, employers have a responsibility to identify hazards and assess associated risks that may lead to workplace bullying. As an employer, you must control any associated risks, review and, if necessary, revise risk control measures.

Related pages

This information is from 'Workplace bullying: A guide for employers'. The complete guide is available in two formats.

Website version PDF guide

Related information

Worksafe victoria.

KTNV Las Vegas, NV

New study sheds link between childhood bullying and mental health struggles in young adults

Posted: April 11, 2024 | Last updated: April 11, 2024

Research has long linked bullying to mental health issues among youth. However, as Channel 13's Anjali Patel explains, a new study is believed to be the first to confirm how bullying leads to distrust, and in turn, mental health struggles in teens. READ MORE: <a href="https://www.ktnv.com/news/new-study-sheds-light-on-link-between-childhood-bullying-and-mental-health-struggles-in-young-adults">https://www.ktnv.com/news/new-study-sheds-light-on-link-between-childhood-bullying-and-mental-health-struggles-in-young-adults</a>

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