Is My Boss Gaslighting Me? What the Research Says So Far
By Dr Danielle Baillieu
You leave a meeting holding two versions of what just happened.
In the first, your manager moved the deadline, criticised you for missing it, and later insisted it had never changed. In the second, you wonder whether you misunderstood everything. Maybe you are too sensitive. Maybe you are seeing a pattern that is not there.
That second version is where the real damage starts. When someone with more organisational power presents themselves as the only reliable narrator, your ability to read your own experience begins to feel unstable. The existential philosopher Søren Kierkegaard described anxiety as the dizziness of freedom (Kierkegaard, 1980), and the Vertigo of Freedom, the phrase used here, draws on that image. It is a philosophical idea, not a research finding about workplaces.
Not every difficult manager is gaslighting you. A hard conversation, a decision you dislike or blunt feedback is not enough. Researchers are now building ways to define and measure gaslighting at work, but the field is young, and the word needs care rather than being used for every unpleasant interaction. Here is what the research says so far, how to tell gaslighting from other things, and what you can do about it.
What workplace gaslighting means in the research
The most useful recent definition comes from Popat and Pandey (2026), a conceptual analysis in Frontiers in Psychology built on a systematic review of how gaslighting has been defined across disciplines. Its key move is to separate what someone does from what the target experiences.
The behaviour has two necessary features:
Trivialisation. Your work, concerns or perspective are minimised, dismissed or reframed. This feature was first described in the scale-development work of Kukreja and Pandey (2023).
Affliction potential. The behaviour is capable of causing pain, distress or a negative outcome for you, whether or not anyone meant it to.
The experience of being gaslit, meaning confusion, self-doubt or a shaky sense of what happened, is treated as separate. According to the paper, it depends on perceived power imbalance, and it varies with your own characteristics, the other person's characteristics and the context. Power can be formal, like a line manager's authority, or informal. Intent does not have to be proven either, because the behaviour can be unintentional.
In practice, this means you do not have to feel self-doubt for gaslighting behaviour to be present. You might see clearly that a manager is rewriting events and stay certain about what happened. Or you might feel your certainty slipping. Both are possible.
The paper is conceptual. It tells us how to define the behaviour, not how common it is, and there are no robust prevalence figures for workplaces yet, so none is quoted here. A review of 266 articles by Kincaid and Stalion (2026) describes the wider gaslighting literature as conceptually fragmented, which is one more reason to use the word carefully. If you want to read further, Ogunfowora and Bourdage (2026) study gaslighting specifically between leaders and employees.
Gaslighting, disagreement, firm management or bullying?
One uncomfortable conversation cannot tell you what is happening. Look at patterns, context and power.
Situation | Core pattern | Power and accountability | Possible impact |
Gaslighting | Your account is repeatedly minimised, denied or reframed | A power imbalance makes it harder to challenge the version of events, and concerns are dismissed rather than examined | Confusion, anxiety, lower confidence, and in some people self-doubt |
Everyday disagreement | Two people hold different interpretations or priorities | Both views can be explored, and evidence and repair stay possible | Frustration, usually with room for respectful resolution |
Firm management | Clear expectations, feedback or consequences tied to the role | Standards, reasons and review routes are explained openly | Discomfort or disappointment, without having to distrust your own memory |
Bullying | Unwanted behaviour that offends, intimidates, humiliates or misuses power | Can be a pattern or a single incident, and can be bullying even if the person does not realise or intend it | Emotional harm, fear, isolation or poorer work functioning |
The bullying row follows Acas (2025), which notes there is no legal definition of bullying and no specific law against it. Bullying can still amount to discrimination under the Equality Act 2010 when it relates to a protected characteristic, and severe bullying can contribute to a constructive dismissal claim. Research definitions of bullying often stress repetition over time, whereas Acas allows for a one-off incident, so the two sources do not line up exactly. Gaslighting has no legal standing of its own either, which Popat and Pandey (2026) point out.
Describe the behaviour, not the person
Do not diagnose your manager. Describe what you can observe:
“The agreed deadline was changed verbally on Tuesday.”
“In Friday’s meeting, the change was denied.”
“When I referred to the follow-up email, I was told I was being dramatic.”
“The performance concern was then recorded as my failure to meet the original deadline.”
Specific language keeps you out of an argument about whether someone is “a gaslighter” and returns attention to conduct.
Why it can harm your mental health
Work is a social and psychological environment as well as a source of income. Your competence, belonging and future security are negotiated there every day. When the account of what happened keeps shifting, that environment stops feeling safe.
People in this position often describe:
Trouble concentrating, and planning or deciding feeling harder than usual
Anxiety, rumination and broken sleep
Physical tension, headaches or nausea
Exhaustion, and pulling away from colleagues
The research so far is early. A 2026 cross-sectional study of 369 nurses in Greece, using an online convenience sample, found that higher workplace gaslighting went with higher anxiety-like and depressive-like symptoms (Katsiroumpa et al., 2026). It covered one occupation in one country at one point in time, and relied on self-report, so it cannot show that gaslighting caused the symptoms. Your own distress needs no study to be valid. The caveat only keeps us exact about what the evidence supports.
For people who have spent years masking, the cost can be larger — the accumulated toll of appearing calm, capable and unaffected while struggling inside can be massive and is often called the ‘Masking Debt’. It is a descriptive term, not an established clinical one.
Kierkegaard and the dizziness of freedom
In The Concept of Anxiety (1844), Kierkegaard separated anxiety from fear (Kierkegaard, 1980). Fear has an object, such as a threat you can name. Anxiety is about possibility, about your own freedom to choose. His image is a person standing at the edge of a cliff. The dizziness comes less from the drop than from the knowledge that they could jump. Anxiety, he wrote, is the dizziness of freedom.
That image helps explain why gaslighting can feel so disorienting at work. To choose well, whether to speak up, stay quiet, escalate or leave, you need firm ground: a reliable account of what was said and agreed. When the person with power keeps rewriting that account, every option stays open but you lose the footing you would use to weigh them. The dizziness is then a reasonable response to unstable ground, not a sign that something is wrong with you.
This is an interpretation, not a research finding. Kierkegaard did not write about workplaces, and no study has tested the link. It is a lens for making sense of the experience, and it points to the practical steps below. A dated record, a written follow-up and a clear account of what happened all rebuild the ground you stand on.
When you are neurodivergent
For autistic, ADHD, dyslexic, dyspraxic or otherwise neurodivergent employees, gaslighting can attach itself to real differences in sensory, communication and processing needs. It can look like this:
Sensory overload reframed as “making a fuss”
A need for written instructions treated as incompetence
Processing time read as resistance or lack of intelligence
Direct communication called rude, while indirect criticism passes as normal
Executive dysfunction under stress labelled as laziness
A request for a quiet space or predictable supervision dismissed as special treatment
Proving that your experience is legitimate takes real mental energy, and that energy is no longer available for the work itself. Over time the strain can leave you with noticeably less capacity. That is a consequence of the situation, not a character flaw.
Reasonable adjustments in England, Scotland and Wales
Under the Equality Act 2010, employers in Great Britain must make reasonable adjustments when a disabled worker would otherwise be at a substantial disadvantage, once they know, or could reasonably be expected to know, about the disability (Acas, n.d.; GOV.UK, n.d.). Adjustments can include changes to working arrangements, communication, equipment, supervision or the physical environment. Northern Ireland has separate disability discrimination legislation. Not every neurodivergent person meets the legal definition of disability, and the legal position depends on the facts, so take advice on your own circumstances.
You usually do not need to share your whole medical history. Your employer does need enough information to understand how the condition affects your work and what would help.
Government research into delays in adjustment decisions (Policy Insights Unit, 2026) found that delays are usually caused by manager confusion, differing ideas of what is reasonable and backlogs, rather than bad faith. A delay is therefore not proof of gaslighting. It can still harm your health and wellbeing, so record it in your chronology, along with the response you received.
What you can do
Start with the record, not the argument. Winning the exchange matters less than having a reliable account to return to.
1. Keep a record as it happens
Use a secure, lawful method that does not breach confidentiality or your workplace policies. Note:
The date, time and place
Who was present
The words used, as closely as you can remember them
What was agreed, changed or denied
Relevant emails, messages, documents and calendar entries
Witnesses, and the effect on your work
Any request you made for support or an adjustment, and the response
Keep the tone factual, and keep what happened apart from what you inferred. A record that does this is far more credible.
2. Follow up verbal conversations in writing
“Thank you for meeting today. My understanding is that the deadline is now Friday 20 November, the report should use the revised template, and we will review progress next week. Please let me know if I have misunderstood anything.”
A message like that reads as polite, and it gives you a dated record.
3. Put adjustment requests in writing
If a disability or health condition affects your work, describe the practical impact and the adjustment you think would reduce the disadvantage. Examples include:
Written agendas and follow-up notes
Clear priorities when tasks conflict
A quieter workspace or fewer sensory interruptions
Predictable one-to-one meetings
Extra processing time
Flexible hours or a phased return, where appropriate
An occupational health assessment
4. Choose your route for raising it
Depending on how safe it feels and how your organisation is structured, you could approach:
Your manager’s manager
Human resources or employee relations
Occupational health
Your trade union representative
Acas, for impartial employment guidance
The Equality Advisory and Support Service, or an employment solicitor, if discrimination may be involved
Employment tribunal claims have strict time limits, so if you are considering one, ask Acas or a solicitor about the deadline early.
You do not have to confront the person privately, especially if that feels unsafe or might invite retaliation. Small, accurate steps taken repeatedly usually serve you better than one exhausting confrontation.
A way through the shame: Name, Normalise, Redirect
The following is offered to help people move from shame towards a next step.
Name. “I am noticing repeated dismissal of my account, and I feel confused and tense after these interactions.”
Normalise. “Uncertainty can activate a threat response. My difficulty concentrating may reflect stress and overload, not personal weakness.”
Redirect. “What is the next practical step? I can write a factual follow-up, save the evidence, seek advice or ask for an adjustment.”
The framework will not tell you whether your manager is gaslighting you. It gives you enough steadiness to decide what to do next.
Where to go from here
Viktor Frankl wrote about the search for meaning under conditions we cannot fully control (Frankl, 2006). At work, hierarchy, money and fear of consequences can narrow your room to move. Describing accurately what is happening to you is one small way of getting some of that room back.
If any of this sounds familiar, write down tonight the last three conversations that left you unsure, with dates and what was said. That is enough for today.
Dr Danielle Baillieu explores how gaslighting becomes normalised across personal and professional relationships in her book, It’s All In Your Head: The gaslighting epidemic hiding in plain sight (Baillieu, 2026).
If you need support now
If you are in immediate danger or there is a risk to life, call 999.
For urgent mental health support, call NHS 111 and choose the mental health option, usually option 2. Availability varies by area.
Samaritans: 116 123, free, any time.
For workplace advice, the Acas helpline is 0300 123 1100.
Explore Life Changes 4 Good’s neurodiversity resources or therapy techniques and research at lifechanges4good.com, or contact Dr Danielle at dr.danielle@lifechanges4good.com.
References
Acas. (n.d.). What reasonable adjustments are. https://www.acas.org.uk/reasonable-adjustments
Acas. (2025). Bullying at work. https://www.acas.org.uk/bullying-at-work
Baillieu, D. (2026). It’s All In Your Head: The gaslighting epidemic hiding in plain sight. Life Changes 4 Good Consulting. https://www.lifechanges4good.com/category/all-products [CHECK: confirm publication status, publisher name and a direct link to the book before posting]
Frankl, V. E. (2006). Man’s search for meaning. Beacon Press. (Original work published 1946)
GOV.UK. (n.d.). Reasonable adjustments for workers with disabilities or health conditions. https://www.gov.uk/reasonable-adjustments-for-disabled-workers
Katsiroumpa, A., Moisoglou, I., Konstantakopoulou, O., Gallos, P., Rekleiti, M., & Galanis, P. (2026). Association between workplace gaslighting, mental health and work life in nurses: A cross-sectional study in Greece. AIMS Public Health, 13(2), 573–588. https://doi.org/10.3934/publichealth.2026030
Kierkegaard, S. (1980). The concept of anxiety: A simple psychologically orienting deliberation on the dogmatic issue of hereditary sin (R. Thomte & A. B. Anderson, Eds. & Trans.). Princeton University Press. (Original work published 1844)
Kincaid, P. A., & Stalion, S. C. O. (2026). An interdisciplinary review of the gaslighting literature and future research agenda. Journal of Organizational Behavior. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1002/job.70103 [CHECK: title, journal and year confirmed, but author names and DOI could not be confirmed from the publisher page]
Kukreja, P., & Pandey, J. (2023). Workplace gaslighting: Conceptualization, development, and validation of a scale. Frontiers in Psychology, 14, Article 1099485. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1099485
Ogunfowora, B., & Bourdage, J. S. (2026). Is my boss gaslighting me? Uncovering the nomological network of gaslighting in leader-employee relationships. Journal of Management. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1177/01492063261426014 [CHECK: title, authors and journal confirmed, but the DOI could not be confirmed from the publisher page]
Policy Insights Unit. (2026). Reasonable adjustments: Research into delays in decisions. Cabinet Office. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/reasonable-adjustments-research-into-delays-in-decisions
Popat, N., & Pandey, J. (2026). Workplace gaslighting: A construct for organizational research. Frontiers in Psychology, 17, Article 1589063. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2026.1589063
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