An investigation of stressful situations in the workplace: the appraisal of and response to workplace bullying, workplace aggression and similar situations

The research project consisted of five concurrent studies analysing the same set of quantitative and qualitative data gathered from 89 participants about their experiences in the workplace. Important findings included individual differences in the way people defined workplace bullying and in the impacts of stressful situations. Workplace experiences such as bullying could be experienced as traumatic and could also lead to posttraumatic growth. Posttraumatic growth, positive self-transformation arising from a difficult life experience, was found to be linked to a thorough exploration of the impact of the event as well as a positive ending to the story.