Psychological consequences of individual narcissism

Benefits of self-compassion

Individuals who develop narcissism experience a range of challenges.  Some of these challenges can be ascribed to a decrease in self-compassion—the tendency of individuals to perceive their failings as universal in all humans, to accept their flaws, and to consider their limitations calmly (Neff, 2003a; Neff. 2003b).  As self-compassion diminishes, these individuals experience a range of problems, from health complications to impaired relationships.

Definition of self-compassion

Self-compassion, although emanating from many Eastern philosophies such as Buddhism, materialised in Western science only recently. Neff (2003a, 2003b) promulgated this state, defining self-compassion as a blend of three distinct, but interrelated facets. First, individuals recognise that pain and failure are inevitable, universal features of the human experience.  Second, because of this recognition, these individuals are more inclined to accept and understand all facets of themselves, including their deficiencies, faults, or afflictions.  Third, because of this acceptance, they demonstrate a balanced perspective of themselves and their emotions—neither disregarding nor inflating unpleasant thoughts or feelings, similar to mindfulness.

To measure self-compassion, Neff (2003a) established an instrument that comprises six subscales—a position variant and a negative variant of the three distinct facets.  The subscales include

• common humanity (e.g., “When I feel inadequate in some way, I try to remind myself that feelings of inadequacy are shared by most people.”),
• isolation (e.g., “When I fail at something that’s important to me, I tend to feel alone in my failure”),
• self-kindness (e.g., “When I’m going through a very hard time, I give myself the caring and tenderness I need”),
• self-judgment (e. g., “When I see aspects of myself that I don’t like, I get down on myself”,
• mindfulness (e.g., “When something upsets me, I try to keep my emotions in balance.”), and
• over-identification (e.g., “When I’m feeling down, I tend to obsess and fixate on everything that’s wrong”).

Association between self-compassion and narcissism

Many studies have revealed that narcissism, or at least some variants of narcissism, are inversely associated with self-compassion.  For example

• in a study of over 250 adolescents, individuals who reported vulnerable narcissism, but not grandiose narcissism, tended to report diminished levels of self-compassion (Barry et al., 2015),
• in a study of over 800 college students, the participants who reported elevated levels of narcissism tended to report less self-compassion but greater burnout as a consequence (Barnett & Flores, 2016).

Furthermore, self-compassion can temper some of the detrimental effects of narcissism (e.g., Gu & Hyun, 2021).  To illustrate, Zhang et al. (2024) explored whether self-compassion diminishes the impact of narcissism on antisocial behaviour in sport.  In one study, over 200 football players completed a survey that assessed narcissism, antisocial behaviour—such as “I swore at a teammate”—and self-compassion.  Generally, narcissism was positively associated with antisocial behaviour.  However, when participants indicated they experience self-compassion to a moderate or significant degree, this association between narcissism and antisocial behaviour dissipated.

Presumably, when individuals experience narcissism, they often experience unpleasant feelings, such as shame, in response to criticisms and other challenges.  To override these unpleasant feelings, they may become more inclined to blame or to belittle other individuals, frequently manifesting as antisocial behaviour.  However, if they experience self-compassion, these unpleasant feelings are not as pronounced.  Their shame, for example, may diminish once they recognise these challenges are inevitable, universal, and acceptable.   Accordingly, as several researchers have recommended, activities that foster self-compassion may moderate some of the adverse consequences of narcissism (Gu & Hyun, 2021).

Implications of these decreases in self-compassion

Some of the challenges and problems that often coincide with narcissism could perhaps be ascribed to self-compassion.  That is, various facets of narcissism, especially vulnerable narcissism, seem to be inversely associated with self-compassion (e.g., Barry et al., 2015).  Consequently, these individuals may not enjoy the benefits of self-compassion. 

Many studies have substantiated the benefits of self-compassion.  Here are some examples:

• Self-compassion is positively associated with optimism, life satisfaction, and a feeling of social connection (Neff, 2003a; Neff, Rude, & Kirkpatrick, 2007), all of which can promote wellbeing.
• Individuals who experience self-compassion can also extend this understanding of their own challenges to appreciate the problems that other people experience, manifesting as empathy.  To demonstrate, in one study (Welp & Brown, 2013), after completing a measure of self-compassion, participants read about a man who was either concentrating intently but accidentally hit a pothole or was distracted while speaking on the mobile and hit a pothole.  Self-compassion was positively associated with empathy and willingness to help, but only if the person had been concentrating intently and, therefore, was not at fault. 
• Consistent with this finding, as Neff and Beretvas (2013) showed, if individuals report elevated levels of self-compassion, they are more likely, according to their partners, to be caring, affectionate, and gentle as well as discuss problems, respect other opinions, and encourage autonomy. 
• People who experience self-compassion are not as likely to feel ashamed of their frailties or distress in response to health concerns.  Consequently, they respond more proactively to health problems.  For example, as Terry et al. (2013) showed, people who experience self-compassion are more inclined to observe the recommendations of their doctor and cope more effectively with diagnosed illnesses.
• Self-compassion does not, as perhaps assumed, foster complacency.  Instead, people who experience self-compassion are often more inspired to improve themselves.  For example, in a series of studies, self-compassion encouraged participants to practice more extensively on task (Breines & Chen, 2012).  In one study, participants completed a difficult vocabulary task.  They were granted time to practice before completing the test again. Next, to induce self-compassion, some participants imagined they were talking to themselves about this failure from a compassionate and understanding perspective.  Relative to various control conditions, self-compassion inspired participants to dedicate more time to practice. 
• Finally, self-compassion also improves motivation.  For example, if people experience self-compassion, they feel more inspired to learn and to initiate more adaptive coping strategies after academic failure (Neff, Hseih, & Dejitthirat, 2005).

In short, people who are narcissistic experience diminished self-compassion, and this diminished self-compassion may compromise wellbeing, empathy, relationships, and motivation to learn or change.  That is, if individuals experience self-compassion, they feel consoled—as if receiving comfort from a supportive relative or friend—after failures or problems unfold.  The unpleasant emotions these challenges elicit abate rapidly.  Individuals can thus manage their problems constructively (for a detailed account and evidence, see Inwood & Ferrari, 2018).    

Social media addiction

Some research has explored whether narcissism may affect the prevalence or magnitude of addictions.  For example, one study, conducted by Nguyen et al. (2025), examined the degree to which narcissism is associated with addiction to social media.  The participants were members of Generation Z and lived in Ho Chi Minh City. The study revealed that, in this population, narcissism was positively associated with social media addiction. 

Arguably, people who exhibit narcissism are fundamentally motivated to boost their status.  To achieve this goal, these individuals, especially if they exhibit grandiose narcissism, crave opportunities to broadcast their contributions or achievements. Social media offers individuals many opportunities to boost their status and is thus reinforcing to narcissistic people, even to the degree that addictions often evolve.

Other addictions

Narcissism is also associated with other addictions as well. To illustrate

• vulnerable narcissism in young adults predicts problem drinking and gambling in the future; feelings of shame tend to mediate these relationships (Bilevicius et al., 2019),
• narcissism in adults, especially if combined with neuroticism, is positively associated with smartphone addiction (Pearson & Hussain, 2017),
• various dimensions of narcissism, such as narcissism admiration and narcissism rivalry, are positively associated with exercise addiction—partly because exercise may enable these individuals to outperform rivals, enhance their appearance, and feel superior (Zeigler-Hill et al., 2021).

One complication that may bias or skew the research on narcissism revolves around response styles.  That is, people who exhibit narcissism like to inflate their capabilities, achievements, power, and importance—although they may acknowledge some attributes that may be perceived as undesirable in social settings (Jones & Brunell, 2014), such as a disinclination to help another person.  Accordingly, narcissistic individuals may not answer questions on surveys accurately.  They may exaggerate their intelligence or status, for example, as well as conceal their failures.   

Nevertheless, some research has challenged this assumption.  Sleep et al. (2017), for example, revealed that narcissistic individuals do not necessarily conceal their faults or challenges in inconsequential surveys.  Indeed, if people exhibit vulnerable narcissism, they seem more inclined than other participants to acknowledge these faults or challenges. 

Specifically, to investigate this matter, the researchers examined three samples of participants—comprising 482 undergraduate students, 703 male prison inmates, and 228 psychology students, respectively.  The samples completed various measures of narcissism, including

• the Narcissistic Personality Inventory,
• the Five-Factor Narcissism Inventory,
• 17 relevant items from the SCID-II for Personality Disorders (First et al., 1997),
• the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory or MMPI–2 (Ben-Porath & Tellegen, 2011), and
• the Personality Assessment Inventory (Morey, 1991)

To assess the response style of participants—that is, the degree to which these individuals may have inflated their attributes or concealed their flaws—the researchers utilised

• the Uncommon Virtuous subscale of the MMPI-2—a metric that gauges the degree to which individuals tend to conceal rather than acknowledge common but minor personal flaws,
• the Adjustment Validity subscale of the MMPI-2—a metric that gauges the extent to which individuals tend to deny the experience of common psychological problems (for evidence of validity, see Sellbom & Bagby, 2008),
• the Positive Impression Management index of the Personality Assessment Inventory—defined as the tendency to deny minor personal faults to generate a positive impression,
• the Defensiveness index of the Personality Assessment Inventory—an index that represents inconsistencies in responses.

In general, the various measures of narcissism were not strongly associated with the various measures of response style.  More specifically

• one measure of vulnerable narcissism, derived from the Five-Factor Narcissism Inventory, was negatively associated with the Positive Impression Management index and Defensiveness index—implying that people who exhibit vulnerable narcissism are especially inclined to acknowledge personal faults or challenges,
• measures of grandiose narcissism were not significantly associated with these indices,
• in the prison inmates, leadership and authority was positively associated with the inclinations to conceal minor personal flaws or psychological problems, but entitlement and the willingness to exploit people was negatively associated with these inclinations. 

One possible complication or explanation is that people who are unwilling to concede their flaws may also be unwilling to report the signs of narcissism.  Therefore, the measures of narcissism may not be accurate enough to detect response biases.