Different country, different problems: examining the way immigrants from former USSR experience and cope with workplace aggression.

In this qualitative study I analyze the way immigrant workers experience workplace aggression in Israeli companies, actions taken to deal with aggression and possible actions to be taken in future.
Study participants were immigrant workers, emigrated from former USSR during last 23 years. Their narratives were analyzed for common topics.
Data show that most participants did not take some actions to cope with aggression; however, some mentioned a few different ways. Two participants’ strategies were successful. Employer responses included indifference and various forms of retaliation. Most participants would allegedly act differently in future.
Questions for future research are suggested.

Table of Contents I. Introduction 4 II. Theoretical background 6 1. Workplace aggression 6 2. Types of workplace aggression. 7 3. Measuring Workplace aggression 8 4. Immigrants as victims of aggression 9 5. Immigrants form former USSR in Israel 11 6. Preventing and coping with workplace aggression 12 III. Method 14 VI. Findings and discussion 16 V. Summary and Conclusions 28 VI. Bibliography 30 VII. Appendix 35

I. Introduction
Almost anyone who has ever worked has experienced workplace aggression in one form or another. Workplace aggression is something we do not like to talk about and something that a lot of people would rather suppress and pretend it has never happened, and yet it is one of the main reasons people quit their job (Berthelsen et al, 2011). It leads to decreased job satisfaction, lowers the employees’ motivation (Baillien et al, 2008), causes psychological and health problems, increases the chance of work-related injuries and illness (Okechukwu et al, 2011), affects