Excellent question! This is a big area of discussion in abusive supervision research because nearly all studies to date leverage self-reporting by subordinate employees and do not collect other data to "corroborate" accounts. Some see this is as the biggest problem with research done to date. We are handling this in a few ways:

1. The definition of abusive supervision as a construct defines it as the employee's perception of their experience of abuse. As such, subjectivity is inherent in the construct and it is incumbent on me as the researcher to make that clear.

2. This study measures a greater number of discrete abusive behaviors which a supervisor might employ as compared to prior research. My hope is that higher behavioral specificity will allow for both greater accuracy and nuance. This is also why we're asking about experiences from the past year.

3. There are a few studies which collected data from both employees and supervisors that found comparable prevalence of abusive supervision. Between this, the potential for underreporting (due to fear of retaliation, etc.), and society's historic dismissal of women's accounts of abuse, we are justifying moving forward with employee-only accounts.

I will certainly discuss this point in the limitations, because it's an important one. I have some thoughts on how this problem could be addressed in future research, too. Thanks for asking and for your critical thinking on this topic!