Narcissism

Danah Boyd reviews the findings of narcissism research:

"let's list a few of the key findings that have emerged over the years concerning narcissism.

• While many personality traits stay stable across time, it appears as though levels of narcissism (as tested by the NPI) decrease as people grow older. In other words, while adolescents are more narcissistic than adults, you were also more narcissistic when you were younger than you are now.

• The scores of adolescents on the NPI continue to rise. In other words, it appears as though young people today are more narcissistic than older people were when they were younger.

• There appears to be a correlation between narcissism and self-esteem based education. In other words, all of that school crap about how everyone is good and likable has produced a generation of narcissists.

• Celebrity does not make people narcissists but narcissistic people seek fame.

• Reality TV stars score higher on the NPI than other celebrities."

(http://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/archives/2007/03/17/fame_narcissism.html)

More Information

Read her blog commentary to see how this is linked to current internet youth culture, and her use of the concept of Micro-fame to distinguish it from the mass media celebrity culture.

URL = http://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/archives/2007/03/17/fame_narcissism.html