Research into workplace bullying has continued to grow and mature since emerging from Scandinavian investigations into school bullying in the late 1970s. Research communities now exist well beyond Scandinavia, including Europe, the UK, Australia, Asia and the USA. While the terms ‘harassment’ and ‘mobbing’ are often used to describe bullying behaviour, ‘workplace bullying’ tends to be the most consistently used term throughout the research community. In the past two decades especially, researchers have made considerable advances in developing conceptual clarity, frameworks and theoretical explanations that help explain and address this very complex, but often oversimplified and misunderstood, phenomenon. Indeed, as a phenomenon, workplace bullying is now better understood with reasonably consistent research findings in relation to its prevalence; its negative effects on targets, bystanders and organizational effectiveness; and some of its likely antecedents. However, as highlighted in this review, many challenges remain, particularly in relation to its theoretical foundations and efficacy of prevention and management strategies. Drawing on Affective Events Theory, this review advances understanding through the development of a new conceptual model and analysis of its interrelated components, which explain the dynamic and complex nature of workplace bullying and emphasize current and future debates. Gaps in the literature and future research directions are discussed, including the vexing problem of developing an agreed definition of workplace bullying among the research community, the emergence of cyberbullying, the importance of bystanders in addressing the phenomenon and the use of both formal and informal approaches to prevention and intervention.

First year university is an important transition context for students. The present study examined the relationship between adjustment and support types, sources and levels of support, and satisfaction with levels of support, for first year students in an Australian university. Comparisons were made between young (17-21 year olds) and mature-aged students and local and international students. Findings indicate that welladjusted students reported higher levels of social companionship support than the less adjusted group. Many students would have liked more support overall. In comparison to the local group, international students would have liked to receive more emotional, practical and informational support. The implications for service provision and university strategies are discussed.

Work‐place bullying is primarily conceptualized in the literature from an individual or interpersonal perspective with a focus on the victim. The impact of the broader organizational context on bullying has also been considered to a lesser extent. Only a small amount of research exists, however, regarding the group‐level processes that impact on the incidence and maintenance of bullying behaviour. We adopt a group level perspective to theoretically discuss and explain the processes involved in the occurrence and maintenance of work‐place bullying behaviours. Using Social Identity Theory (Tajfel & Turner, 1986) and Social Rules Theory (Argyle, Henderson, & Furnham, 1985), two conceptual frameworks are presented that consider work‐place bullying at the intra‐group and inter‐group levels. Several propositions are put forward regarding the likelihood of bullying in work groups. Suggested directions for empirical research are addressed and practical implications are also discussed.

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Workplace bullying is a phenomenon that is attracting increasing interest from researchers throughout the Western world. To date, most of the research into workplace bullying has focused on managers and colleagues as the perpetrators of bullying in the workplace. By contrast, little is known about ‘upwards bullying’, where managers are the targets. We argue that in order to more fully understand workplace bullying as a whole, the phenomenon of upwards bullying requires research attention. In the present study, upwards bullying was explored in interviews conducted with 24 managers from public and private organizations, with the data coded and arranged thematically. Results indicate that potential contributing factors towards upwards bullying include the current work environment, change within organizations and power issues. We recommend that organizations identify the occurrence and processes of upwards bullying as important steps in developing comprehensive workplace bullying policies.

Social capital theory (SCT) is used as a lens for operationalising the impact of one type of workplace relationship -the supervisor-subordinate relationship (measured using leader-member exchange (LMX)) -upon employees' perceptions of work-family conflict (WFC) and in turn, job satisfaction. The analysis distinguishes between different types of employees (professional and nonprofessional) within different work contexts (public and private sector). A crosssectional survey design was used to collect data from a sample of 180 police officers and 1064 nurses (898 private sector and 344 public sector employees).The findings show that the supervisor-subordinate relationship predicted 43.3% of police officers' perception of WFC, but only 2.9% of nurses' perception. Moreover, 33.46% of the variance of job satisfaction was explained by employees' perception of LMX and WFC, although the impact was stronger for police officers in particular and public sector employees in general. The implication is that organisations will benefit from promoting effective workplace supervisor-subordinate relationships.

Workplace bullying is a phenomenon that is attracting increasing interest from researchers throughout the Western world. To date, most of the research into workplace bullying has focused on managers and colleagues as the perpetrators of bullying in the workplace. By contrast, little is known about ‘upwards bullying’, where managers are the targets. We argue that in order to more fully understand workplace bullying as a whole, the phenomenon of upwards bullying requires research attention. In the present study, upwards bullying was explored in interviews conducted with 24 managers from public and private organizations, with the data coded and arranged thematically. Results indicate that potential contributing factors towards upwards bullying include the current work environment, change within organizations and power issues. We recommend that organizations identify the occurrence and processes of upwards bullying as important steps in developing comprehensive workplace bullying policies.

A basic underlying assumption of the psychological contract is that both parties come to a mutual agreement about the expectations and obligations of a contract of employment. Recent research provides evidence of the potential for employees to develop unrealistic expectations from this contract and this has been described as a sense of entitlement. In this article, we outline two studies. In the first study, we test the internal structure and reliability of a scale we developed and named the Measure of Employee Entitlement. In the second study, we test the predictive validity of the Measure of Employee Entitlement against a measure of reciprocity. The development and validation of the Measure of Employee Entitlement extends our knowledge of sense of entitlement in the workplace and situates entitlement as a factor that may impact on the development of psychological contracts. This research provides a platform from which researchers and practitioners can continue to coherently and consistently investigate the phenomenon of employee entitlement.