How to bully-proof higher education

Zoé Ziani (2022) sheds light on why higher education is fertile ground for bullying behavior – and offers several suggestions for how to bully-proof higher education organizations.

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Research reveals that bullying behavior is more common in higher education than in other industries. “33% of academics report being victim of bullying (vs. 2% to 20% of people employed in other industries depending on the country considered [2,7]).”

“In particular, bullying behaviors seem particularly frequent in advisor-advisee relationships: The Nature 2019 PhD survey on more than 6300 early career-researchers revealed that 21% of respondents had been bullied during their PhD, and that for 48% of them the perpetrator was their supervisor. In most cases, the victims of bullying felt unable to report these behaviors, for fear of personal repercussions [8].”

Bullying “encompasses a large range of behaviors (e.g., incivility, intimidation, social isolation, humiliation, emotional abuse or physical aggression) in various contexts (school, family, workplace, social media).” While bullying can be tricky to define, “there is a consensus that bullying is an aggressive behavior characterized by hostile intent, power imbalance and repetition [6].”

“While the economic cost of workplace bullying is difficult to assess, the negative consequences are well-documented. Victims are more likely to suffer from emotional issues, health disorders, extreme stress, feelings of worthlessness and shame [13]. Organizations suffer from an erosion of creativity, a reduced organizational commitment, job dissatisfaction, a decreasing productivity, an increased absenteeism, and a higher turnover rate [14–16].”

“Research suggests that hiring toxic workers can be incredibly costly for companies, even when those toxic workers are high performers [20]: Between hiring a superstar (very high performer) and avoiding a toxic worker, companies are often better off avoiding the toxic worker.”

An etiology of bullying in academic organizations

The environment and organizational structures and processes can deter or encourage bullying. Academia “has multiple features that can be conducive to bullying”:

A strong power imbalance between advisors and advisees
A loose organizational structure, with little oversight
A unidimensional hiring and promotion process

Power imbalance

“The strongest power asymmetry in academia is between graduate students and their supervisor. Very early on, PhDs are required to closely work with a supervisor who is supposed to guide them through their PhD journey. Graduate students are highly dependent on their supervisor for access to data, research budget, networking opportunities, recommendation letters… In addition, this relationship is characterized by a certain degree of opacity and informality: Interactions between supervisors and PhDs are rarely monitored or attended by third parties. This dependence and isolation can pave the way for bullying behaviors.”

Loose management

“A ‘laissez-faire’ or inadequate leadership can lead to bullying behaviors [9–11]: If figures of authority in the organization are perceived as weak, it is assumed that they will not intervene in bullying situations, which gives free reign to potential bullies to abuse others [5].”

A unidimensional hiring and promotion process

Academics “are selected and promoted on their publication records, and much less so on their social skills and emotional intelligence.” This encourages an organizational culture in which the end justifies the means.

“The very revealing adage of academia, ‘publish or perish’, sets the tone of this culture. Publications in top journals define the pecking order among academics, and by the same token, make most behaviors justifiable as long as they can help achieve this goal. This ethos, that makes publishing a matter of survival, legitimizes abusive behaviors.”

This organizational culture makes it difficult for PhD programs to intervene into abusive situations and for PhDs to report the behaviors they are victim of.

“This narrow selection process can have multiple negative effects. It weeds out people who have good social skills but have a weaker publication record, it signals that social skills are not worth developing, and most importantly it legitimizes the stereotype of the ‘brilliant jerks’: prolific researchers who lack basic social skills (i.e., emotional regulation, self-reflection, and perspective-taking).”

“Indeed, it is not rare to find that departments are willing to recruit, promote or even protect bullies, as long as they have the right number of publications, sending the message that toxic behaviors can be bargained [12].”

How to build a bully-proof organization

First, organizations should not hire bullies. “The most obvious solution” is not to hire people who are more likely to engage in bullying behavior. This strategy requires that organizations try to screen bullies based on personality traits during the recruitment and promotion process.

“Research suggests [17–19] that bullies are more likely to exhibit specific personality traits: They are aggressive, hostile, competitive, assertive, confrontational, impulsive, and moody. They have difficulty to self-analyze, to regulate their emotions and lack empathy. On the OCEAN personality inventory, they are typically low in Agreeableness and Conscientiousness and high in Neuroticism and Extraversion. They can also be high in narcissism and psychopathy.”

Second, “organizations should base their recruitment and promotion decisions not only on productivity and achievement, but also on social skills and emotional intelligence.”

Third, organizations should identify and mitigate structural factors that allow bullies to thrive. “Another important step is to determine organizational features that might enable bullying.” Many aspects of organizational culture may accidentally foster bullying:

The quest for excellence (e.g., top chefs in the kitchen industry) [21]; an organizational culture that celebrates toughness (e.g., army, prisons, firefighters) [22–25].
A socialization process that features initiation rituals (e.g., hazing) [5,26].
A large number of informal and casual behaviors that make more difficult for some employees to distinguish ‘proper and professional’ behaviors from ‘borderline and inappropriate’ behaviors [27].

Fourth, organizations can implement a “no asshole rule.” “As a leader, publicly and strongly reaffirming that bullying and other destructive behaviors do not have room in the organization can be a very powerful move.”

“If leaders do not walk the talk, they risk promoting a culture of impunity and hypocrisy within the organization.”

“To be effective however, this zero-tolerance policy must be accompanied with effective policies that discourage and punish bullying, and on the contrary reward constructive interactions [28].”

To go further…

Woolston, C. PhDs: the tortuous truth. Nature 575, 403–406 (2019)

Minor, D. & Housman, M. G. Toxic Workers. Acad. Manag. Proc. 2015, 13189 (2015)

Moss, S. Research is set up for bullies to thrive. Nature 560, 529–529 (2018)

Breevaart, K., Wisse, B. & Schyns, B. Trapped at Work: The Barriers Model of Abusive Supervision. Acad. Manag. Perspect. (2021)