Article Review #2: Cyberbullying and women in the workplace
Research summary
In the journal article “Cyberbullying and Psychological Stress among Female Employees” Doghan and Arshad (2024) address the issue of cyberbullying and its effect on female employees. Doghan and Arshad’s research question examined the effect cyberbullying had on the psychological health and job satisfaction of female employees in Saudi Arabia, as well as investigate how organizational commitment, and perceived interactional justice were affected by cyberbullying (Doghan and Arshad, 2024, p.168). The researchers posed four hypotheses. The first and second hypotheses sought to prove the negative influence cyberbullying had on organization commitment and the positive relationship cyberbullying had with workplace stress (Doghan and Arshad, 2024, p.171). Doghan and Arshad prefaced their research by defining the crucial key term of interactional justice which they described as “the employee’s belief that they are respected in organizational interactions” (Doghan and Arshad, 2024, p.171). This was important in understanding the third through fifth hypotheses which examined the effect of perceived interactional justice on job satisfaction and how cyberbullying negatively influenced perceived interactional justice.
Social science principles
The principles of social science demonstrated by the researchers in this study are that of ethical neutrality, empiricism, parsimony and determinism. The researchers demonstrated the social science principle of determinism by highlighting the cause and effect relationship between cyberbullying and interactional justice. Cyberbullying negatively impacted interactional justice and therefore increased stress and decreased commitment to the organization of the women surveyed (Doghan and Arshad, 2024, p.179). The researchers demonstrated ethical neutrality by collecting the surveys from willing participants, collecting their information with consent. They also sought to obtain information from varying female professionals in the field to account for bias. As mentioned earlier, the researchers demonstrated parsimony by defining terms and jargon beforehand. Finally, the social science principle of empiricism was demonstrated by their use of a detailed questionnaire to obtain their data.
Research methods and challenges
In order to obtain their research data, Doghan and Arshad utilized self-administered questionnaire surveys given to various Saudi Arabian female employees. All surveys data was collected with consent. The sparse existence of research and literature on the effects of cyberbullying in the workplace particularly on cyberbullied women was one of the initial challenges of the researchers. Another challenge that the researchers faced was obtaining a comprehensive enough data set of female workers in their survey, which they addressed by using modelling tools. To help qualify their results and test their results, Doghan and Arshad used tools such as the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) and structural equation modeling (SEM) to help test their hypotheses (Doghan and Arshad, 2024, p.176) and develop a reliable questionnaire. The modeling tools also helped them also evaluate the reliability of the results by establishing statistical baselines from which to draw their assessments.
Relationship to class concepts
After reviewing the research conducted by Doghan and Arshad, their research aligns most with Module 9 “Culture, Social Media and Cybersecurity.” Doghan and Arshad examined the workplace subculture and how it was changed by cyberbullying. In that PowerPoint, I learned that cyberbullying is a major social factor in social media that is harmful and can cause significant harm to the individual and society. The findings of Doghan and Arshad supports this particularly when it comes to women in the workplace.
Conclusion and impact to marginal groups in society
In conclusion, Doghan and Arshad found that an employee who is subject to cyberbullying is less committed to their organization. Women specifically were substantially impacted by stress from cyberbullying, affecting their well-being and work performance. (Doghan and Arshad, 2024, p.179) The findings of this research is a positive impact to women who make up the lesser half of the workforce, and are a minority in the STEM workforce. The research also drew attention to cyberbullying in the workplace, encouraging the establishment of reporting policies to prevent harm to employees. By adding to the limited body of work on workplace cyberbullying, the research opens the door for further research in society for other areas besides Saudi Arabia where the data was gathered. This project also opened up next steps for researching other subjects, such as researching the effect on male workers.
References:
Al Doghan, M. A., & Arshad, S. (2023). Cyberbullying and Psychological Stress among Female Employees. International Journal of Cyber Criminology, 17(1), 166-184.