The role played by forensic psychologists in cases of mobbing or workplace harassment is essential to assess the harm that these types of situations generate in the worker and also to understand the intentionality of the person or people who carry them out.
More and more mobbing situations are being detected. These situations are difficult to prove and are usually complicated due to the subtle strategies of the harasser. Furthermore, for the worker, there are situations they consider workplace harassment, but which may not be. A psychological expert report links the worker’s state with the reported facts. It will be proof that the person is affected and suffers from psychological damage or moral damage.
This report must meet a series of methodological guarantees, and proper training of the forensic psychologist is indispensable for it to be reliable. It is important to differentiate a psychological expert report carried out by a psychologist from one carried out by a medical psychiatrist. Medical psychiatrists normally use the clinical interview as the main means of evaluation. Forensic psychologists, in addition, also apply a series of tests, psychopathological tests, and the study and analysis of the reported facts and situations, which provide greater validity to this type of evaluation. In this way, the forensic psychologist’s evaluation, in addition to confirming or not the presence of certain symptoms characteristic of workplace harassment and ruling out the presence of indicators that suggest possible simulation through the clinical interview, provides other objective data about the symptomatology, personality traits, and, above all, the presence or absence of simulation of the discomfort the person reports.
In the forensic field, the use of assessment instruments that offer the most objective data possible is very important to give greater validity to those simply collected through the clinical interview. And the training of the forensic psychologist is key to conducting complete evaluations, knowing how to analyze the results to prepare the psychological expert report, and avoiding errors and possible deceptions.
In addition to making a diagnosis and ruling out its simulation, the psychological expert must perform a differential diagnosis. This analyzes other possible diagnoses that the evaluated person may have and that can be confused with the diagnosis made, such as delusional disorder or personality disorder.
The forensic psychologist must also assess the possibility that the reported situation corresponds only to a situation of workplace conflict or stress. This type of event can generate discomfort in a person and lead to the development of psychopathology.
The psychological expert report in a workplace harassment lawsuit is useful and necessary but not sufficient on its own. It is considered more than proof of harassment; it is proof of the person’s state and an instrument to rule out simulation and other possible causes that may better explain the worker’s condition. It has more value than a clinical report before the Courts of Justice because from the moment the evaluation begins, an expert tries to rule out simulation, which the clinician does not do.
The ISEP Master in Forensic Psychology provides the fundamental competencies for the exercise of the forensic psychologist profession in their expert function, as an expert or advisor to the jurist and judge in judicial processes. The program is designed for the acquisition of the necessary tools for the preparation of the forensic report and its presentation before Courts and Tribunals. In addition, it includes the drafting and defense of the expert report before a court.