Bullying y mobbing

The bullying and mobbing among children at school are very common today. Starting in first grade, young children are involved in a variety of situations that can lead to disagreements and arguments. Without a doubt, these forms of social interaction are unavoidable and absolutely relevant for young people, as they are at an early stage of social development. However, when a larger group of children or the entire class becomes involved in the conflict, the scale of the psychological impact on the child increases and can cause a variety of negative psychological consequences for the student in the future. Individual or collective bullying, which is usually prolonged, is very hard for anyone, especially children themselves.

What is the difference between mobbing and bullying?

Unfortunately, bullying at school is a widespread phenomenon in different countries. What is the difference between mobbing and bullying exactly?

Mobbing is a form of psychological violence in the form of massive harassment towards a person in a group. In a school setting, it is a kind of emotional abuse in which the whole class or most of the students ostracize another child and start bullying him with certain intentions, for example to force him to leave school.

Bullying , on the other hand, is also a systematic and repetitive bullying by a student or a group of students towards another child who is weaker, less powerful and cannot protect himself . It is usually done in the form of psychological terror, which is supposed to scare the victim, demoralize, humiliate, and force that person to be obedient to the bullies.

Emotional abuse and bullying happen in different ways:

• Physically it includes hitting, pushing, kicking, etc.
• Behavioral includes boycott, ignoring a person, ostracism, intrigues, blackmail, extortion, creating problems (stealing personal effects, destroying the school newspaper, notebooks). Verbal aggression is expressed in constant teasing, joking, name calling, yelling, and even cursing. gossip (distribution of obviously false rumors that attempt to dehumanize the victim).
• Cyberbullying is a very popular phenomenon among teens, including bullying with the help of social media or email. This also includes making and posting videos that are inappropriate for the public.

Bullies are extremely creative. Harassment is not limited to a certain gender, height, nationality or personal preferences as well as its reasons can be very different. Therefore, any child can become a target. Sometimes there may even be no specific motive for the assault. Bullies often tease someone who is different from other children and who cannot defend himself.

Consequences of mobbing and bullying

Bullying has negative consequences for both victims and bullies.

Being a victim, the child suffers a series of mental injuries, which inevitably affect his future life:

Mental disorders. Even a single case of bullying leaves a deep emotional scar that requires special treatment by a psychologist. The child becomes aggressive and anxious, subject to depression and behavioral deviations. They have difficulty building relationships and are often bullied in the workplace as well. World statistics show that the majority of adults who had been abused in childhood tend to remain single in life, achieving less success in their careers and experiencing difficulties in daily communication.

Although the aggressor suffers less from the harassment than the victim, it still has consequences in his life:

Primitive antisocial behaviors rarely lead to successful social adaptation: they tend to have difficulties communicating with others, have conflict, and have low social status in general. Children, who were bullies and had high social status, become dictators in their families and at work. Even if they achieve high results in their careers, lack of friends and difficulties in communicating lead to psychological problems. Other people tend to be uncomfortable with ex-bullies, even if they manage to have a successful life. Communication problems could also run in their own families. They do not know how to build a warm relationship based on trust with children and their loved ones. It is very common that they simply copy the behavior of their own parents.

Prevent bullying in the workplace

Because the impact of workplace bullying can be devastating to a small business, owners and managers must take employee behavior and office culture seriously.

Human Resources Policies: Human resources personnel must recognize the danger that moral harassment poses to individual workers, as well as to the company as a whole. Implementing anti-bullying policies, as well as processes that treat victims as valuable employees deserving support and protection, rather than as nuisances, can go a long way toward improving the office culture and reducing incidents of bullying and bullying.

Leadership Attitude: It is reasonable for company leaders to expect employees to behave like adults and resolve personality conflicts in a professional manner. However, there are situations in which victims of interpersonal assault, including the bullied, may find it difficult to defend themselves without the support of management. Evidence that workers are being abused by others must be taken seriously, both for the benefit of the victims and for the long-term health of the company.

Office culture assessment: In some cases, office culture and policies can encourage bullying and mobbing. For example, if executives and managers communicate that it’s okay to treat employees poorly, a hostile culture will flourish, in which the strongest employees continually pick on the most vulnerable. While healthy competition can be beneficial to an organization, a hyper-competitive atmosphere can trigger harassment from excellent employees.

The mobbing and bullying can also occur in companies that do not regularly evaluate the performance or behavior of employees. When a company tolerates an employee who is not pleasant to work with, who does not follow office policies, or who does not complete their work, other employees may resent it. This can lead to harassment from the employee who does not like or performs poorly. Unfortunately, morale in the office will likely have dropped significantly by the time workers take matters into their own hands.

Small business owners who were concerned about office culture and standards can benefit from hiring a small business management consulting firm. The consultant can assess what is happening in the office and help create changes in the environment to boost morale and foster healthy interactions between employees.