Guwahati, Feb. 10 -- Jason Walker, Adler University and Deborah Circo, University of Nebraska Omaha

The phenomenon of bullying, harassment and sexual abuse in workplaces throughout North America is widespread and harmful to both individuals and organizations. In fact, bullying at work affects up to 30% of workers over time.

As practitioners and researchers who study workplace violence, including bullying, harassment and sexual abuse, we define workplace bullying as harmful acts of mistreatment between people that go beyond incivility and cross the line to intentionally causing harm.

Bullying behaviours range from verbally insulting or socially excluding someone to sabotaging the victim's work, inflicting psychological terror and engagi...