Study: Easily offended are bad employees and hypocrites

A new study has found that millennials who are easily offended are the worst employees. The report, from San Diego State University, says that easily offended people never get anything done and worse, are hypocrites.

Dr. Jeremy Bernerth asked almost 400 employees with an average age just above 25, at seven colleges across the nation about recent events that have received “substantial media attention”.

The study notes that the events consisted of “17 items developed to assess the proclivity to be offended, eight moral outrage items, 11 microagression items and nine political correctness items.”

It noted that some people have a high “proclivity to be offended” (PTBO), which the study describes as “a state-like tendency to be sensitive to customarily innocuous societal events and traditions”.  One example was playing of the United States’ National Anthem.

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Those with a high PTBO have a “tendency to view an array of events and/or traditions as offensive.”

They also “are likely to feel that social events or traditions to which they take offense also violate moral or equitable standards,” the study notes.

The study shows these young people easily triggered…by anything that doesn’t fit their narrow world view.

Bernerth found that easily offended individuals are less productive, because they are constantly worrying their employer being less fair than other employers and they expende an inordinate amount of time “complaining about trivial matters.”

“The person offended by everyday occurrences diverts important and limited cognitive resources away from the client (and potential sale) towards a task-irrelevant stimuli.” the study notes.

The study also notes that the easily offended are selfish and much less concerned with helping others while they tell people they are concerned about others.

The study notes that while “their prescriptive morality dictates helping and providing for others”, they are actually less likely to engage in “citizenship behavior”.

The study noted that “PTBO negatively correlated with task performance and positively correlated with counterproductive work behaviors, suggesting not only that these individuals engage in fewer citizenship behaviors but also engage in behaviors managers and organizations want their employees to avoid.”

–Wire services