The Effect of Nurses’ Perceptions of Mobbing on Burnout and Organizational Trust: The Moderating Role of Public Leadership Roles

Background: In contemporary healthcare settings, the high workload, emotional labor demands, and organizational stressors faced by nurses pose significant threats to their psychological well-being and the quality of care they provide. These stressors often precipitate adverse workplace behaviors, such as mobbing (i.e., psychological harassment in the workplace). The extant literature indicates that mobbing contributes to burnout syndrome among employees and undermines organizational trust. However, empirical evidence concerning the moderating effect of leadership roles on these relationships remains limited. Objective: This study seeks to investigate the impact of nurses’ perceptions of mobbing on their levels of burnout and organizational trust within public hospitals in Türkiye. Furthermore, it aims to elucidate the moderating effects of four fundamental public leadership roles—Accountability, Compliance with Rules, Political Loyalty, and Network Governance Leadership—on these relationships. Method: Adopting a cross-sectional and quantitative research design, data were collected via a structured survey administered to nurses employed in public hospitals across the TRA1 region of Türkiye (N = 501). The validity and reliability of the measurement scales were assessed using confirmatory factor analysis and Cronbach's alpha coefficients. The proposed hypotheses were tested through linear regression and moderation analyses. Findings: The results indicate that nurses’ perceptions of mobbing significantly diminish organizational trust while exacerbating burnout levels. Moreover, the leadership roles of Accountability and Network Governance were found to moderate these relationships by attenuating the detrimental effects of mobbing. Conversely, Compliance with Rules Leadership appeared to strengthen the negative impacts. Conclusion: These findings underscore the critical role of ethical, transparent, and collaborative leadership practices in safeguarding the psychosocial well-being of nursing personnel. To mitigate mobbing and reduce the risk of burnout, it is recommended that healthcare policies integrate robust leadership development initiatives and organizational justice mechanisms. Clinical trial number: Not applicable.