Instituto de Psicoterapia e Investigación Psicosomática

Bullying breeds paranoia

This is an excellent article, and much to the point. But it misses very important question: whence does the unusual behaviour of the “persistent complainant” come from? It is easy to conclude, as indeed the authors seem to imply, that it is idiosyncratic, a process, in Jasperian terms. However, we suspect that, in many cases, it may be a reaction to abnormal external circumstances. We have some data to back this contention. We have applied the Spanish version of Derogatis´ SCL90R questionnaire to 194 consecutive complainants registered by the Spanish Association against Psychological Harassment at the Workplace. Our subjects had been previously tested with the LIPT-
60 (Leymann Inventory of Psychological Terrorization – 60 items) and interviewed by psychological trained officers of the Association, who excluded those who had no objective basis for their complaints. Our results show that the general scores and all the dimensions of psychopathology were far higher in the complainants than in the general population.