The Roles of Work-Life Conflict and Gender in the Relationship between Workplace Bullying and Personal Burnout. A Study on Italian School Principals

Ilaria Buonomo, Caterina Fiorilli, Luciano Romano and Paula Benevene
Additional contact information
Ilaria Buonomo: Department of Human Sciences, LUMSA University, 00193 Rome, Italy
Caterina Fiorilli: Department of Human Sciences, LUMSA University, 00193 Rome, Italy
Luciano Romano: Department of Human Sciences, LUMSA University, 00193 Rome, Italy
Paula Benevene: Department of Human Sciences, LUMSA University, 00193 Rome, Italy

IJERPH, 2020, vol. 17, issue 23, 1-17

Abstract: The present study sought to investigate the associations between workplace bullying and personal burnout both directly and indirectly via work-life conflict. Furthermore, the moderating role of gender in these relations was examined. Traditional research on stress at work focuses on the role of dimensions related to job tasks, demands, and organizational support in influencing the risks for stress-related problems in employees. At the same time, other experiences at work may reduce employees’ well-being, such as workplace bullying and family life. Specifically, considering the detrimental role of work-life conflict, it is possible to hypothesize that it would exacerbate workplace bullying’s harmful effects on employees’ health. Moreover, since previous studies have reported mixed or inconsistent results when considering gender differences with the above-mentioned dimensions, it seems worth investigating the role of employee gender in representing (and response to) the bullying experiences. Building on these considerations, this work verifies whether: (1) work-life conflict mediates the relationship between workplace bullying and burnout; (2) gender moderates all the possible relationships among the constructs. Such hypotheses are verified on a sample of school principals, in light of their peculiar job role. Overall, our findings showed that: (1) Workplace bullying and burnout are associated, both with and without the perception of a concurring work-life conflict; (2) Gender does not moderate all the possible relationships among workplace bullying, work-life conflict and burnout. Overall, being female heightens the risk to perceive work-life conflict in general, as well as to be burnt out, when bullied, with and without the presence of work-life conflict; being male heightens the risk to perceive work-life conflict when bullied. Furthermore, the current findings suggest that family demands may influence school principals’ feelings of exhaustion regardless of gender. These findings confirm and expand previous literature, especially concerning a less studied occupation, namely school principals, shedding a new light on their work experiences. Furthermore, the present study offers interesting implications for trainings on principal’s skills and professional identity.

Keywords: psychosocial risks; workplace bullying; gender differences; work-life conflict; school principals; educational organizations (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/17/23/8745/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/17/23/8745/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:17:y:2020:i:23:p:8745-:d:450617

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().