Research update: What happens when you challenge a narcissist?

“Narcissus does not fall in love with his reflection because it is beautiful, but because it is his. ” WH Auden

As the dangers of narcissism (NPD) in the workplace (and the courtroom) become more obvious, the research into its manifestations becomes both more interesting and more useful. A recent study examined the behavior of normal and narcissistic job applicants in their initial interviews. Narcissists scored much higher in their initial interviews, primarily because their tendency to self-promote, their ability to engage the interviewers, and  to speak at length (about themselves, of course) conveyed confidence and expertise. At first glance, this style is quite successful, as these folks are really good at self promotion. None of this is news. What is news is what happened when the interviewers challenged the self promotional "puffing".

When challenged, the normal applicants tended to back down from their exaggerated claims of expertise. Not the narcissists. Rather than back down, the narcissists "doubled down"; they increased their efforts to look better! The narcissistic response to being challenged was "Oh yea, you want to challenge me? I am not just good, I am great!" My take on  this "unexpected" response is this: Any challenge to the expertise, knowledge, success, power, or brilliance of a NPD is perceived as a narcissistic insult, and must be defeated by a display of GREATER expertise, knowledge, success, power or brilliance. The response is to being "questioned" is both automatic and predictable.  NPDs protect their image at all costs. They have to.

In the context of family law litigation, this response to being challenged is evident every day in hearings and depositions. NPDs, who are usually but not always men, dramatically exaggerate their parenting skills, their career successes, their financial acumen, and their legal "expertise" in their self-serving testimony. When challenged by opposing counsel, they don't make admissions; they make even greater self-serving exaggerations. The reactions of their long-suffering spouses to these courtroom fabrications is equally predictable: they fear that once again everyone will be taken in by the NPDs gift of believable but factually distorted self promotion and that the case will be over before the lies can be uncovered.

The practice tip for family law attorneys is this: whether the NPD is your client or the other party, pay close attention when their self-promoting pitch is being challenged--if the response is "Oh yea, let me tell another story about how wonderful I am", an NPD is loose in your case, and truth will be hard to come by. Be very skeptical of ALL their testimony or you will get burned. Nothing is more important to an NPD than their image. Nothing.

Reference: University of Nebraska-Lincoln (2012, April 2). How do I love me? Let me count the ways, and also ace that interview. ScienceDaily. Retrieved April 9, 2012, from http://www.sciencedaily.com­/releases/2012/04/120402144738.htm

Narcissism Research Update: new fMRI research can distinguish narcissism from normal

Narcissism is over-represented among people involved in divorces, and in my experience with hundreds of litigated divorce cases, narcissists are involved in a high percentage of litigated divorces. New research has further refined both the public persona and the unique brain characteristics of narcissistic people (NPD).

First, the public persona. Researchers compared narcissists identified by their personality test scores and compared their Facebook pages with more normal people. The results were just what one would expect. Narcissistic people had a greater number of "friends' than those who were not, a confirmation of the NPD tendency to have more but shallower relationships. Their profile photos tended to be more stylized and "glamour shot"-like than less narcissistic people. Finally, their posts tended to be more self-promoting. For more information look here: http://www.science20.com/news_articles/narcissists_can_be_identified_their_facebook_accounts_psychologists-32720

This research is consistent with some other research which compared annual company reports  and other company PR of narcissistic CEOs with those of companies run by normal people. As expected, the text of reports of narcissistic CEOs had more references to "I" and fewer to "we", had larger photos of the CEO on covers and press releases, and were generally more self-promoting than company promoting. There are a notable gap in salary between the CEO and the second in command in these companies as well, unlike companies without narcissistic CEOs.

Both of these findings provide tools for divorce attorneys to do some free discovery on clients or spouses in these public records and get a "heads up" about the personality functioning of these people without a mental health professional evaluation or records (most narcissists NEVER see a shrink, so records are rare).

Now for the look inside the brain of a narcissist. Research investigating the function of the medial prefrontal cortex (MPC) in maintaining self-perception compared normal and narcissistic people on their ability to identify faces after a brief shock. The shock had scrambled the MPC for a fraction of a second and the participants were shown pictures of themselves, friends, and known strangers during the interval when their MPCs were scrambled. Normal people could identify friends and strangers but NOT themselves, confirming the function of the MPC in self recognition. However, even when the MPC was "off-line", narcissists could still identify their own photos. The researchers concluded that narcissists have larger portions of their brains devoted to "ME" (wonderful, glorious, fabulous me, I might add) than do normal people. This research may be another step toward developing an reliable imaging (fMRI) diagnostic tool for identifying NPD. It may also identify the neural underpinnings of this very destructive personality disorder.

For more information about this research and other fMRI research on narcissism, look here: http://www.science20.com/brain_trust_diy_science_today039s_top_minds/definitive_fmri_test_narcissism-87875

NPD is an aggravating factor in a large percentage of very malignant divorces, so better diagnosis, especially of the non-psychological test variety, will be increasingly helpful in future child custody evaluations.