A national online survey of school teachers has shown that almost all of the participants have been the targets of some form of bullying in the workplace.

More than 800 school staff members participated in the study, which found that 99.6 per cent of them had experienced one or more of the 44 kinds of bullying listed in the survey.

The Executive Summary of the research team’s report says the results “highlight the indisputable fact that bullying of staff does occur in Australian schools”. “When bullying affects the mental and physical health of those being bullied, as results show, then it is time for some action to be taken to eliminate staff bullying,” the report says.

The research focused on answering the following questions: “Does bullying of staff occur? Who are the bullies and who are the targets? Who are the persistent bullies? Who are the primary targets? What forms of bullying of staff occur? What is the effect of bullying on the individual? Are there gender differences in the incidence, form and effects of bullying? What strategies diminish the practice of bullying?”