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Occupational violence has significant legal, economic and emotional consequences for employers and individuals. A definition of occupational violence is:
`Occupational violence is the attempted or actual exercise by a person of any force so as to cause injury to a worker, including any threatening statement or behaviour which gives a worker reasonable cause to believe he or she is at risk.'1
Categories of violence
Occupational violence can include verbal abuse, threats, physical violence, homicide, `behaviours that create an environment of fear, stalking, bullying amongst workers or between managers and workers, and behaviours that lead to stress or avoidance behaviour in the recipient. While there may be a fine line between bullying behaviours and sexual harassment, sexual violence at work is not normally included within definitions of occupational violence.
A useful typology is to separate violence into three basic categories:
*'Internal' violence between employees within an organisation, such as between supervisor and employee, or employees and apprentices;
*'External' violence perpetrated by persons outside the organisation, such as during armed hold-ups in shops; and,
* `Client-initiated' violence inflicted on workers by their customers or clients.2
It is crucial to note that while all three types can occur on the one worksite, the perpetrators have distinct characteristics and the prevention strategies differ markedly.
Some authors identify a fourth and more systemic form of violence caused by wider social and economic pressures. For example, global economic pressures may lead to work inten-sification, job insecurity, and contribute to heightened anxieties in a workplace culture where threatening behaviour is tolerated.3
The extent of violence Comprehensive data on the extent of violence in Australian workplaces does not exist The seminal international work on occupational violence patterns was written by Chappell and Di Martino in 2000(4) and published by the tripartite International Labour Office.
The consistent pattern evident in data from the UK, the US and Australia is that jobs where (a) cash is on at hand (external violence), and (b) tasks that involve a lot of face-to-face contact between workers and clients (client-initiated violence) are higher risk.
The potential for violence may increase at particular times of the day or night; on specific days of the week; at venues where intoxicated people gather; if large amounts of cash, valuables, or drugs are...