Key sections included information that profiled Targets and their Bullies/Perpetrators, detailed destructive tactics experienced, and the impact of bullying on their health. The results of those analyses appear below.

[Subsequent analyses will describe psychological and workplace conditions that predict who among the Targets is likely to be traumatized and will explore in-depth characteristics of the hyperaggressive perpetrators.]

Principal investigator: Gary Namie, Ph.D.

Student assistants from Western Washington University: Adrienne King, Heather Hagle, Jennifer McDonagh, Tiffany Whitman, Brian Perry, Michelle Butler and Jennifer Hippensteal

The 5-point WBI definition of Workplace Bullying:

is the repeated, health-endangering mistreatment of a person (the Target) by a cruel perpetrator (the bully).

is best understood through the bully's behaviors--acts of commission and omission--which are all driven by the bully's need to control other people.

involves initially the bully deciding who is targeted, when, where and how psychological violence will be inflicted. Later, others may be coerced to participate in the assaults.

it is illegitimate, not "tough," behavior; it interferes with an employee's work production and the employer's business interest

it escalates from 1:1 harassment prior to being reported followed by a limited or non-existent employer response, eventually engulfing an entire work unit in fear, paralyzing productivity.