Workplace incivility: An empirical study in health sector

Having a beatiful life is a common wish of all. It is a wish that includes so many different parameter behind, based on basic values seems simply. These basic values may occur of so different concepts such as social, moral, economic, faith-related, familial, psychological, or derived from many other concepts. It is focused on the concept of incivility, which is one of these basic values. The main question of this study is: "What are the feelings of employees when the concept of civility, essential for proper communication in society and the opposite of incivility, is not applied?" How do employees, who are part of the social environment of the workplace and are under the pressures of job demands such as work stress, workload, and emotional exhaustion, respond to these uncivil behaviors, especially when they work in the service sector where they are supposed to be constantly smiling? By the way, the business life does not only contain of negative situations, but also includes motivating factors. Apart from the negative job demands, it is searched the mediating role of motivating factors such as job satisfaction or emotional social support between the uncivil behaviors and negative emotions. Having a job is not enough motivating factor on its own for sustaining our lives. While working, we also need to feel good. By the context of the study, healthcare workers, with whom we interact, are exposed to various work-related stressors that can negatively impact their psychological well-being. For instance, workplace incivility is an increasingly institutional concern, with the potential to harm individuals' well-being and increase the risk of work-related mental health problems. Furthermore, getting uncivil behavior may lead individuals to engage in similar uncivil behavior. In this context, the research focused on nurses, whom are a crucial part of the healthcare sector that we entrust our lives to. It examined if these nurses respond to uncivil behavior with incivility and how much their general well-being is affected by this incivility. In this model where incivility is the independent variable, the mediating roles of job resources, such as emotional social support and job satisfaction, and job demands, such as job stress, workload, and emotional exhaustion, within the framework of the Job Demands and Resources theory, were searched. Additionally, from a different perspective, the study also explored, how much incivility, experienced by patients/relatives, is reflected to healthcare workers and how much affected their general well-being. The study consists of two models, analyzing the responses of both service providers and recipients in the healthcare sector within the same time frame. It is expected that analyzing both sides simultaneously will contribute to the literature. In the research with nurses, combining both quantitative and qualitative analysis techniques, a mixed-methods approach was studied. The qualitative findings supported the quantitative data by providing narrative interpretations. In the research with patients, just quantitative analysis techniques were applied. In the models developed based on the findings from the literature, both supported and unsupported hypotheses were found. In the research focusing on nurses' perspectives, it was found that patient/relative incivility had a positive and significant impact on nurses' incivility towards patients as a retaliatory behavior. On the other hand, it is found that, patient/relative incivility had no significant impact on nurses' general well-being. The qualitative research stated that employees made a distinction between their work related well-being and their general well-being. The findings showed that their work related well-being was negatively affected by their business life while their general well-being was not. It was found that patient/relative incivility had a positive and significant effect on job demands such as job stress, workload, and emotional exhaustion. On the job resources perspective, it had no effect on the perception of emotional social support, while it had a negative and significant impact on job satisfaction. Job stress and workload did not have a significant effect on either uncivil behavior or general well-being. However, emotional exhaustion had a positive and significant effect on uncivil behavior, but no significant effect on general well-being. The perception of emotional social support and job satisfaction did not have a significant effect on uncivil behavior, but they had a positive and significant effect on general well-being. No mediating effects of job stress and workload were found between patient/relative incivility and uncivil behavior, while emotional exhaustion was found as having a full mediating effect. Similarly, no mediating effects of job stress and workload were found between patient/relative incivility and psychological well-being, but emotional exhaustion was found to have a full mediating effect. No mediating effects of the perception of emotional social support and job satisfaction were found between patient/relative incivility and uncivil behavior. In the relationship between patient/relative incivility and psychological well-being, the perception of emotional social support did not have a mediating effect while job satisfaction was found to have a full mediating effect. In the study from the patients' perspective, it was found that nurse incivility had a positive and significant effect on patients' retaliatory incivility towards nurses. However, nurse incivility did not have a significant effect on patients' general well-being. The findings were compared with the current literature, and the study was concluded with suggestions for future research.