Nurses as enactors of workplace aggression: Can perception of organisational support cushion the influence of job demands on them?

To date, little is known about nurses as enactors of workplace aggression as the preponderance of research have been asymmetrically tilted towards nurses as targets of workplace aggression, whereas nurses as enactors of workplace aggression remains fallow. To that end, we developed and tested a model in which perception of organisational support (POS) moderated the relationship between job demands and enactment of workplace aggression. Self-report data were collected at three large hospitals from 224 hospital nurses (34 males and 190 females) and hypotheses were tested with moderated multiple regression and simple slope analyses. Results were consistent with our hypothesised model such that job demands contributed to significant increase in the enactment of workplace aggression whereas POS accounted for significant decrease in the enactment of workplace aggression. Also, POS moderated the positive relationship between job demands and workplace aggression. Specifically, job demands exerted less influence on enactment of workplace aggression when POS was high rather than low. Therefore, nurses should be trained to cope better with the demands of their jobs and be able to adequately utilise job resources such as those that can facilitate POS.