Moving Narcissus: Can Narcissists Be Empathic?
Abstract
Empathy plays a critical role in fostering and maintaining social relations. Narcissists lack empathy, and this may account for their interpersonal failures. But why do narcissists lack empathy? Are they incapable, or is change possible? Three studies addressed this question. Study 1 showed that the link between narcissism and low empathy generalizes to a specific target person presented in a vignette. The effect was driven by maladaptive narcissistic components (i.e., entitlement, exploitativeness, exhibitionism). Study 2 examined the effect of perspective-taking (vs. control) instructions on self-reported responses to a video. Study 3 examined the effect of the same manipulation on autonomic arousal (heart rate) during an audio-recording. Perspective-taking ameliorated negative links between maladaptive narcissism and both self-reported empathy and heart rate. That is, narcissists can be moved by another’s suffering, if they take that person’s perspective. The findings demonstrate that narcissists’ low empathy does not reflect inability, implying potential for intervention.
... Notably, this research is correlational and should be interpreted cautiously. Future research should adopt experimental approaches to explore whether individuals high in Antagonism can feel greater empathy for animals (e.g., Hepper et al., 2014). ...
... Research on animal-centered empathy is important, as it could provide further insight into empathy in narcissistic individuals. Narcissistic individuals can be empathic towards others when they are encouraged to take the perspective of the person in need (Hepper et al., 2014). Some therapeutic approaches for Narcissistic Personality Disorder involve teaching individuals how empathy looks and when it should be used, which assumes that these individuals have little sense of empathy (Baskin-Sommers et al., 2014). ...
Having empathy for others is typically generalized to having empathy for animals. However, empathy for humans and for animals are only weakly correlated. Thus, some individuals may have low human-centered empathy but have high animal-centered empathy. Here, we explore whether pet owners who are high in narcissism display empathy towards animals despite their low human-centered empathy. We assessed pet owners’ ( N = 259) three components of trait narcissism (Agentic Extraversion, Antagonism, and Narcissistic Neuroticism), human- and animal-centered empathy, attitudes towards animals, and their pet attachment. We found that Agentic Extraversion was unrelated to both human- and animal-centered empathy. We also found that Antagonism was related to less empathy for both humans and animals, as well as more negative attitudes towards animals. Lastly, we found that Narcissistic Neuroticism was unrelated to human-centered empathy and positively related to animal-centered empathy and attitudes towards animals. This research furthers our understanding of the relation between empathy towards humans and animals and provides insight into whether animal-assisted approaches may be useful for empathy training in those with narcissistic characteristics.
... Indeed, some scholars argued that narcissists lack empathy and tend to engage in few prosocial behaviors. 6 In contrast, another study pointed out that narcissists strategically display prosocial behaviors to gain attention or praise from others to increase their narcissistic self-esteem. 7 Narcissism is prevalent among college students, and the younger generation generally exhibits self-appreciative behavior. ...
Purpose:
Although plenty of studies have examined the antecedents of organizational citizenship behavior, empirical studies exploring the role of individual narcissism in relation to college students' organizational citizenship behavior are relatively scarce. Drawing on the dual theory of narcissism and the conservation of resources theory, this study aimed to explore the relationship between narcissistic duality traits (narcissistic admiration and narcissistic rivalry) and organizational citizenship behavior of college students, and to further examine the mediating role of impression management motivation (assertive impression management motivation and defensive impression management motivation) and the moderating roles of teamwork, interpersonal relationships, and optimism.
Methods:
We used the questionnaire method with a sample of undergraduate and graduate students from several universities in Hubei, China. The data sample for analysis consists of 583 college students.
Results:
(1) Narcissistic admiration had a significant and positive effect on college students' organizational citizenship behavior, while the effect of narcissistic rivalry was significant and negative; (2) assertive impression management motivation mediated the relationship between narcissistic admiration and college student's organizational citizenship behavior, and defensive impression management motivation mediated the relationship between narcissistic rivalry and college student' s organizational citizenship behavior; and (3) teamwork, interpersonal relationships, and optimism positively moderated the relationship between narcissistic admiration and assertive impression management motivation, and these variables positively moderated the indirect effects of assertive narcissism on college student's organizational citizenship behavior through assertive impression management motivation.
Conclusion:
We found that college students with narcissistic admiration engaged in more organizational citizenship behaviors than those with narcissistic rivalry. In addition, narcissistic admiration had a positive effect on organizational citizenship behavior through assertive impression management motivation, and narcissistic rivalry had a negative effect on organizational citizenship behavior through defensive impression management motivation. Finally, teamwork, interpersonal relationships, and optimism significantly and positively mediated the relationship between narcissistic admiration and assertive impression management motivation, and the indirect effect of narcissistic admiration on organizational citizenship behavior through assertive impression management motivation. However, the direct effects of teamwork, interpersonal relationships, and optimism on the relationship between narcissistic rivalry and defensive impression management motivation, and the indirect effect of narcissistic rivalry on organizational citizenship behavior through defensive impression management motivation were not significant.
Narcissism and its clinical analogue, Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD), comprise a set of personality constructs characterized by
pervasive patterns of grandiosity in fantasy and behavior, feelings of uniqueness and superiority, excessive need for admiration, a sense of entitlement,
arrogance, self-centeredness, and low empathy. With some evidence suggesting that trait narcissism levels are increasing in the world, understanding
its consequences is increasingly pressing. As the capacity to recognize and understand others’ emotional states and to feel a similar emotion to
another person, a lack of empathy in grandiose narcissistic individuals and NPD patients has long been observed. However, the narcissistic trait can
also be manifested in a lesser-studied form, vulnerable narcissism, which shares the features of self-absorption, entitlement, conceit, disregard for
others and interpersonal antagonism, but presents with low self-esteem, introversion, shame, psychological distress, and fragility. Given its variants
in self-regulatory functioning, studies have found that vulnerable narcissism may differently relate to empathy. Will the vulnerable narcissistic trait
be negatively associated with empathy for pain? According to the Dynamic Self-Regulatory Processing Model, vulnerable narcissistic individuals
need to reduce their attention to pain of others and reduce their level of pain empathy to regulate their emotions and thus maintain a positive view of
themselves. In present research, we systematically test this hypothesis by two studies.
In Study 1, we investigated whether the attentional bias toward others’ painful faces mediates the relation between trait vulnerable narcissism
and pain empathy. The level of trait vulnerable narcissism was measured by the Hypersensitive Narcissism Scale (HSNS). The attentional bias
toward others’ painful faces was measured by the dot-probe paradigm, in which a painful face and a neutral face were presented simultaneously for
500 ms, and the participants had to indicate the positions of the probes after the face presentations. The empathy for pain was measured by using a
pain judgement task, in which participants were asked to rate the intensity of pain portrayed by faces of 10 Chinese models. The results of Study 1
showed that, trait level variations in vulnerable narcissism were negatively associated with attentional bias toward painful faces, which in turn led to
lower levels of empathy responses to painful faces. In addition, the results also revealed that such an association held even when the effects of control
variables, including age, gender, education, positive affect and negative affect, were controlled.
In Study 2, we further investigated whether the eye movement pattern in pain perception mediates the relationship between trait vulnerable
narcissism and pain empathy. In this study, participants were asked to complete a pain judgment task, in which painful faces or neutral faces was
presented for 2000 ms and participants had to indicate the intensity of pain portrayed by those faces in 10-point-scale. Eye movements were tracked by
the SMI RED 500 eye-tracker when participants were viewing the faces. Four areas of interests were selected (i.e., areas of forehead, eyes, nose, and
mouth). The results showed that trait vulnerable narcissism was negatively associated with the fixation duration within the eye areas of painful faces,
which in turn led to the decreasing empathy for pain.
In summary, results of the present research support our hypothesis that vulnerable narcissistic individuals have deficits in their ability of pain
empathy, which is caused by their reduced attentions toward others’ painful faces.
Narcissistic youth use social media to engage in a variety of self-promotional behaviors, which have either antisocial or prosocial characteristics. Differing views exist to explain the processes underlying narcissistic self-promotion, either characterizing these actions as intentional, or as impulsive. This study compared intentional attention-seeking and impulsivity as potential mediators of relations between narcissism and both aggressive (i.e., cyberbullying) and prosocial online behavior, and examined whether youth’s loneliness might strengthen these associations. Among Chinese early adolescents ( N = 213, M age = 13.26), narcissism positively predicted youth-reported cyberbullying offending and online prosocial behavior. Loneliness moderated the link between narcissism and attention-seeking, but not impulsivity. Among adolescents higher in loneliness, narcissism indirectly predicted cyberbullying and online prosocial behaviors via attention-seeking. These results highlight narcissism, loneliness, and their interplay as potential predictors of youth’s social media behaviors. Links with attention-seeking, in particular, suggest that educators and practitioners might target youth’s conscious expectations for social rewards when counseling narcissistic adolescents about self-promotional social media use.
Il presente lavoro è partito da una rassegna dei contributi storici sulla concettualizzazione del narcisismo e del Disturbo Narcisistico di Personalità (DNP), evidenziando l'evoluzione in termini di diagnosi clinica all'interno della classificazione DSM sui disturbi mentali. Si è focalizzato sulla complessità del Disturbo Narcisistico di Personalità e l'utilità di definirlo come un continuum che va dalla normalità alla patologia piuttosto che una mera categoria. All'interno di questo continuum gli autori hanno identificato le due varianti di interesse, il narcisismo overt o grandioso e covert o vulnerabile. Gli autori proseguono enucleando le principali sfide nella gestione dei pazienti con tratti narcisistici, responsabili degli esiti peggiori nella terapia.Le terapie psicologiche specificamente progettate per il trattamento dei pazienti con DNP sono relativamente poche e pochi o nessuno di questi trattamenti sono stati testati in studi controllati randomizzati. Emerge quindi come il trattamento delle PN o con DNP rappresenti una sfida sia sul piano clinico che empirico poiché mancano prove empiriche su come trattarli. La mancanza di trattamenti supportati empiricamente, ha fatto emergere la necessità di delineare linee guida di "buona pratica clinica", in linea con l'idea di un approccio più integrato al trattamento dei disturbi di personalità
Empathy is the ability to understand and share the feelings of others. Researchers
have also described the concept as the capacity to “walk in someone else’s shoes”
and see the world from their perspective. It is comprised of emotional empathy,
which involves the ability to share the emotions of another person, and cognitive
empathy, which is the intellectual ability to understand another person’s emotions
and mental state. Empathetic skill plays a key role in social life as it contributes
to promoting prosocial behavior and avoiding or limiting aggressive situations.
Specifically, it is essential when the protagonists of the social interaction belong
to opposite social groups, such as race, age, gender, and formal or informal groups
(e.g., doctor versus patient, professor versus student, caregiver versus care recipient). For example, the literature shows how sexual offenders have lower levels of
both cognitive and emotional empathy than the general population. A possible
reason for this is that individuals with low levels of empathy do not understand
the other person’s distress and thus they are unable to take the perspective of the
victim.
Due to its relevance to all aspects of life and interactions with others, empathy has
received interest and attention from social science and neuroscience to understand the mechanisms behind empathetic skills and the possibility to train them.
From the neuroscience point of view, it has been investigated that the empathetic
relationship involves mirror neurons that are activated when someone observes
and experiences emotions and that the medial prefrontal cortex is primarily
involved. Alternatively, clinical psychology has demonstrated how the ability
to be empathetic moderates levels of depression and anxiety and contributes to
increasing positive emotions. However, it is interesting how often empathy and
compassion, the latter of which is the feeling of care and concern for others, are
interchangeable and how sometimes excessive levels of empathy can generate
compassion fatigue.
Regarding empathy training programs, in the last decade, virtual reality (VR)
was defined as an empathy machine. VR is a tridimensional and immersive environment and, thanks to the head-mounted display, permits the user to embody
another body and feel the emotions of that avatar.
This book discusses advanced research on empathy and its social impact. Chapters
cover theoretical models and innovative research in the field of empathy with
experimental validation and high scientific value.
Narcissistic personality disorder is characterized by self-absorption, grandiosity, exploitation of others and lack of empathy. People with that disorder may switch from an overt form, mainly with grandiosity, to a covert presentation, with fears, hypersensitivity and dependence from others. Empathy represents a key point in detecting people affected by narcissistic personality disorder because, even if it is described as reduced, it plays a fundamental role in exploitation and manipulation. A systematic search of Literature without any language or time restriction, was performed combining thesaurus and free-search indexing terms related to Narcissistic personality disorder and empathy and produced 531 results. Fifty-two papers that analyzed possible issues in the empathic attitude of people with narcissistic personality disorder were included in this narrative review. Empathy is the capability of understating and feeling others emotions. It is not a unitary construct and can be distinguished in cognitive and affective. It might be channeled into prosocial and antisocial behaviors. A crucial trait identified in narcissistic empathy is affective dissonance that is closely related to rivalry as part of the dark tetrad (narcissism, machiavellianism, psychopathy, and sadism). Subjects affected by narcissistic personality disorder show greater impairment in affective aspects while their cognitive part of empathy appears preserved. Saving at least the cognitive aspects of empathy may contribute to therapeutic improvement of affective aspects.
Reactions to trait self-enhancers were investigated in 2 longitudinal studies of person.perception in discussion groups. Groups of 4-6 participants met 7 times for 20 rain. After Meetings 1 and 7, group members rated their perceptions of one another. In Study 1, trait self-enhancement was indexed by measures of narcissism and self-deceptive enhancement. At the first meeting, self-enhancers made positive impressions: They were seen as agreeable, well adjusted, and competent. After 7 weeks, however, they were rated negatively and gave self-evaluations discrepant with peer evaluations they received. In Study 2, an independent sample of observers (close acquaintances) enabled a pretest index of discrepancy self-enhancement: It predicted the same deteriorating pattern of interpersonal perceptions as the other three trait measures. Nonetheless, all self-enhancement measures correlated positively with self-esteem.
We present a process model that distinguishes 2 dimensions of narcissism: admiration and rivalry. We propose that narcissists' overarching goal of maintaining a grandiose self is pursued by 2 separate pathways, characterized by distinct cognitive, affective-motivational, and behavioral processes. In a set of 7 studies, we validated this 2-dimensional model using the newly developed Narcissistic Admiration and Rivalry Questionnaire (NARQ). We showed that narcissistic admiration and rivalry are positively correlated dimensions, yet they have markedly different nomological networks and distinct intra- and interpersonal consequences. The NARQ showed the hypothesized 2-dimensional multifaceted structure as well as very good internal consistencies (Study 1, N = 953), stabilities (Study 2, N = 93), and self-other agreements (Study 3, N = 96). Narcissistic admiration and rivalry showed unique relations to the Narcissistic Personality Inventory (NPI), the Big Five, self-esteem, pathological narcissism, and other narcissism-related traits like Machiavellianism, psychopathy, self-enhancement, and impulsivity (Study 4, Ns = 510-1,814). Despite the positive relation between admiration and rivalry, the 2 differentially predicted general interpersonal orientations and reactions to transgressions in friendships and romantic relationships (Study 5, N = 1,085), interpersonal perceptions during group interactions (Study 6, N = 202), and observed behaviors in experimental observations (Study 7, N = 96). For all studies, the NARQ outperformed the standard measure of narcissism, the NPI, in predicting outcome measures. Results underscore the utility of a 2-dimensional conceptualization and measurement of narcissism. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved).
To facilitate a multidimensional approach to empathy the Interpersonal Reactivity Index (IRI) includes 4 subscales: Perspective-Taking (PT) Fantasy (FS) Empathic Concern (EC) and Personal Distress (PD). The aim of the present study was to establish the convergent and discriminant validity of these 4 subscales. Hypothesized relationships among the IRI subscales between the subscales and measures of other psychological constructs (social functioning self-esteem emotionality and sensitivity to others) and between the subscales and extant empathy measures were examined. Study subjects included 677 male and 667 female students enrolled in undergraduate psychology classes at the University of Texas. The IRI scales not only exhibited the predicted relationships among themselves but also were related in the expected manner to other measures. Higher PT scores were consistently associated with better social functioning and higher self-esteem; in contrast Fantasy scores were unrelated to these 2 characteristics. High EC scores were positively associated with shyness and anxiety but negatively linked to egotism. The most substantial relationships in the study involved the PD scale. PD scores were strongly linked with low self-esteem and poor interpersonal functioning as well as a constellation of vulnerability uncertainty and fearfulness. These findings support a multidimensional approach to empathy by providing evidence that the 4 qualities tapped by the IRI are indeed separate constructs each related in specific ways to other psychological measures.
There is considerable evidence that trait empathy affects single-episode helping behavior. However, the influence of empathy on more continuous altruistic behavior, such as voluntarism, has not been investigated. This study utilizes a four-dimensional empathy scale, the Davis Interpersonal Reactivity Index, to assess the relationship between trait empathy and voluntarism. Structural equation analysis results indicate that Perspective Taking, Empathic Concern, and Personal Distress dimensions of empathy are positive antecedents of voluntarism as hypothesized. The Fantasy dimension was not related to voluntarism.
The chameleon effect refers to nonconscious mimicry of the postures, mannerisms, facial expressions, and other behaviors of one's interaction partners, such that one's behavior passively rind unintentionally changes to match that of others in one's current social environment. The authors suggest that the mechanism involved is the perception-behavior link, the recently documented finding (e.g., J. A. Bargh, M. Chen, & L. Burrows, 1996) that the mere perception of another' s behavior automatically increases the likelihood of engaging in that behavior oneself Experiment 1 showed that the motor behavior of participants unintentionally matched that of strangers with whom they worked on a task. Experiment 2 had confederates mimic the posture and movements of participants and showed that mimicry facilitates the smoothness of interactions and increases liking between interaction partners. Experiment 3 showed that dispositionally empathic individuals exhibit the chameleon effect to a greater extent than do other people.
Publisher Summary It is possible for one person to experience an emotion when he or she perceives that another person is experiencing an emotion. The relationship between action and the sharing of feelings is obviously not a simple or direct one. It is possible to study so subtle and important a phenomenon as empathy in the laboratory and to examine some of the determinants of empathy. The process leading to empathy can be understood in terms of cognitive variables such as the mental set that the person has when he or she observes the other. The form or type of social relationships between one person and another influences the amount of empathy, presumably because the form of the social relationship influences the manner of perceiving the other and thinking about him or her. Individual differences in reactions to social situations, in perceiving the other, and in thinking about him or her must be considered in predicting how much empathizing will occur. These individual differences appear to be determined in part by the birth order of the person.