Cognitive hardiness as a moderator in the relationship between generalized workplace harassment and anger among working women in Pakistan

ABSTRACT

Previous research literature shows that women face sexual as well as generalized harassment at their workplaces but most of the working women do not recognize generalized harassment as harassment and consider it as routine job problem which has no solution except staying quiet. Therefore, the primary objective of the present study was to relook at the issue of workplace harassment by taking generalized harassment into account that was previously limited to sexual harassment only. Harassment at the workplace is taboo in Pakistani society where women fear raising their voice for the sake of job security and their character. The current study investigated the relationship between generalized workplace harassment and anger and the moderating role of cognitive hardiness in this relationship. A sample of 300 women (M = 28, SD = 8.01) age ranged 18 years to 57 years, from diverse working environments, were selected from the province of Punjab and Islamabad Capital Territory, Pakistan. The results revealed that generalized workplace harassment was a significant positive predictor of anger among the working women. Cognitive hardiness moderated this relationship significantly. The relationship between generalized workplace harassment and anger was observed to be stronger for lower levels of cognitive hardiness. This study has helped in identifying risk factors brought by generalized workplace harassment that can help organizations in policymaking against this issue Figure 1.

KEYWORDS:

• Generalized workplace harassment
• anger
• cognitive hardiness
• working women
• Pakistan

Acknowledgments

First of all my humblest gratitude to Almighty Allah, the source of knowledge and wisdom, endowed to mankind, who bestowed me with a potential and ability to contribute a little to the knowledge of mankind, who made all the things possible for me till the end. I express my deep and sincere gratitude to my supervisor Dr. Sadaf Ahsan for her valuable and timely guidance, mentoring, immense knowledge, encouragement, and motivation that shall carry me a long way in the journey of life on which I am about to embark. I could not have imagined having a better supervisor and mentor than her for my research work. I express my gratitude towards my beloved life partner Dr. Ali Arshad for being a constant source of enthusiasm and encouragement, my parents for their prayers and support. Finally, my thanks and appreciation to my friends and people who willingly helped me out with their abilities.

Compliance with ethical standards

Procedures involving human participants were according to the ethical standards of the institutional review board. Participation in the study was voluntary and informed consent was taken from individuals.

Declaration of interest statement

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of the research article.