The Workplace Bullying Institute (WBI) wrote the survey and commissioned Zogby International to collect data for the second representative study of all adult Americans on the topic of workplace bullying. WBI conducted the first national study in 2007.
The 2010 Survey
There were two 2010 surveys – one with several items and 4,210 survey respondents (MOE +/- 1.5 percentage points), and one single-item survey with 2,092 respondents (MOE +/- 2.2 percentage points). Each sample was representative of all American adults in August, 2010.
What is Workplace Bullying?
In Survey 1, Workplace Bullying was defined as “repeated, health harming abusive conduct committed by bosses and co-workers.” In the single-question survey (Survey 2), Workplace Bullying was defined as “repeated mistreatment: sabotage by others that prevented work from getting done, verbal abuse, threatening conduct, intimidation, & humiliation” in order to make the direct comparison to the 2007 WBI-Zogby prevalence question.
Key Findings
- 35% of workers have experienced bullying firsthand (37% in 2007, given the MOE, essentially
equivalent) - 62% of bullies are men; 58% of targets are women
- Women bullies target women in 80% of cases
- Bullying is 4X more prevalent than illegal harassment (2007)
- The majority (68%) of bullying is same-gender harassment
Prevalence of Workplace Bullying
35% of the U.S. workforce (an est. 53.5 million Americans) report being bullied at work; an additional 15% 
witness it. Half of all Americans have directly experienced it. Simultaneously, 50% report neither experiencing nor witnessing bullying. Hence, a “silent epidemic.”
Gender and Workplace Bullying
Both men and women bully, but the majority of bullying is same-gender harassment, which is mostly legal according to anti-discrimination laws and workplace policies. Women target women.
Chosen excerpts by Job Market Monitor
via 2010 WBI U.S. Workplace Bullying Survey | WBI.
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