A 16-year-old demands that an entire road be blocked off so a marching band can play while she arrives at her birthday party on a red carpet. Meanwhile, some people hire fake paparazzi to follow them around when they go out at night, while a children’s book explains why plastic surgery can give them a “beautiful mommy.”
Anecdotal evidence such as this, backed by research, has been used over the past 10 years to argue that narcissism is on the rise among youth. But it has also stirred up controversy in psychology circles, which is why LAS professor Brent Roberts was asked to weigh in on the debate.
His conclusion?
“I think the idea that youth today are more narcissistic than young people in the past is overblown,” says Roberts, a University of Illinois psychology professor.
If you look solely at data published at San Diego State, he says, “it would be reasonable to conclude that narcissism has been on the increase over the last three decades.” But when Roberts and two colleagues added data gathered by other researchers, including his own work at Illinois, they came up with an entirely different picture. The combination of multiple studies showed little to no increase in narcissism over the past 30 years.
Although Roberts doesn’t see an increase in narcissism among young people today when compared to youth in the past, his research does show that younger people are generally more narcissistic than either middle-aged or elderly people. As he puts it, “Every generation is Generation Me.”
What’s more, Roberts and postdoctoral researcher Patrick Hill came upon a surprising result in their study. “We found that for young people, certain aspects of narcissism were linked with happiness and well-being,” he says.
However, Roberts and Hill also found that the same narcissistic traits can decrease life satisfaction for people when they reach middle age.
The two researchers surveyed 368 Illinois undergraduates and 439 family members, mostly mothers, and asked them questions to determine their level of narcissism. The researchers focused on three forms of narcissism: an inflated sense of leadership and authority; grandiosity or showing off; and a sense of entitlement and willingness to exploit people for personal gain.
The first two qualities, an inflated sense of leadership and grandiosity, increased feelings of life satisfaction among students, but it decreased happiness in older individuals. The third quality, a sense of entitlement, decreased life satisfaction among all people, young and old.
Roberts says their research does not provide definitive reasons for the results, but one theory is that leadership and grandiosity may help young people in college because it boosts confidence, drawing them to leadership roles that bring admiration from peers. This confidence, even if it’s inflated, can help them navigate this tumultuous period of life.
“But why does thinking you’re a good leader not play out as a positive thing for older individuals?” he asks. “That’s the mystery.”
Roberts speculates that it might have to do with experience. As people get older, they realize that leadership takes much more than being confident in front of groups. In addition, what is viewed as confidence among young people may be viewed as conceit in middle-aged individuals.
“I have to assume that the consequences of living out this narcissism over decades can be problematic,” he says. “Clinical psychologists describe narcissists as the most difficult therapy clients because they don’t take feedback very well. They think they are very special, and people describe them in less than glowing terms. If people are responding to you negatively over time, you might begin to feel bad about it as you get older.”
Roberts points out that although their research shows that college-aged youth are more narcissistic than their parents, the people in their study, both young and old, did not score high in narcissism, on average.
“Older people will always think that younger people are more narcissistic than they are, but this is more of a developmental issue than a generational issue,” he says. “We tend to get less narcissistic with age.”
