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Aggression and violence are of increasing concern to American employee and employer however, these have received limited research attention in the management literature. We focus here on those aggressive actions and violent outcome that are instigated by factors in the organization itself, labeled organiation-motivated aggression (OMA) and organization-motivated violence (OMV. Specifically, we define the terms OMA and OMV, provide a social l earning model of OMA, and present research propositions related to the model
Violence is one of the most troubling issues facing American society today. Over 1.9 million violent offenses occurred in 1993, including more than 24,000 murders (Federal Bureau of Investigation, 1993). The workplace is not immune to the effects of violence. Indeed, statistics indicate that violence has become a fundamental organizational problem. During 1992, the most recent year for which information is available, 1,004 Americans were murdered on the job (Rigdon, 1994). Homicide is currently the second leading cause of death in the workplace, behind transportation accidents (Filipczak, 1993; Rigdon, 1994). According to the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, homicide is the leading cause of workplace death for women, accounting for 42 percent of their on-the-job fatalities (Bensimon, 1994; Kedjidjian, 1993; National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, [NIOSH] 1993). A recent American Management Association (AMA) survey of 311 organizations found that almost 25% indicated at least one employee had been attacked or killed on the job since 1990 (Rigdon, 1994). In fact, it has been suggested that workplace homicide is the fastest growing form of murder in the United States (Filipczak, 1993) and that violence directed against an employer or former employer,
During the time this research was conducted, Anne O'Leary-Kelly was a member of the Department of Management at Texas A&M University. The authors gratefully acknowledge the helpful comments of Lynda M. Kilbourne, Robert Albanese, and four anonymous reviewers on earlier drafts of this article. which has doubled since 1989, is the fastest growing category of workplace violence (Bensimon, 1994).
Although homicide is the most extreme example, it is only one form of organizational violence. One survey estimated that during a one-year period, more than 2 million employees were physically attacked (physical assault with or without the use of a weapon), more than 6 million received threats (an...