The bright side of dark: Exploring the positive effect of narcissism on perceived stress through mental toughness

Abstract

We gratefully acknowledge all the participants that took part in these three studies. We are particularly grateful to a number of undergraduate and MSc students that acted as research assistants and contributed to data collection at London Metropolitan University and Queen's University Belfast. The studies were not preregistered. Author Contributions K.A.P. has written the manuscript and he was responsible for data collection and data preparation; F.M.G., D.B., P.W. and G.B.M. were responsible for data collection and data preparation for study 3; K.A.P., F.M.G. and G.B.M. have performed the statistical analyses; P.J.C. and G.B.M. provided critical reviews and comments during the write-up of this manuscript. P.J.C. is responsible for the conceptualisation of MT (as described in this manuscript) and the creation of the MTQ48 to assess MT; K.A.P. was responsible for the overall conceptualisation of the studies that are presented in this manuscript. All authors contributed to the revisions of this manuscript.

Bridging the gap: A network approach to Dark Triad, Mental Toughness, the Big Five, and perceived stress

“…Whereas some found positive associations among all 4Cs and narcissism, psychopathy, and Machiavellianism (Sabouri et al, ), others reported a positive correlation between MT and narcissism, but negative correlations among MT, psychopathy, and Machiavellianism (Onley et al, ). Similar associations (in terms of size and direction) emerged in another study, which reported that confidence is the strongest (out of the 4Cs) correlate of narcissism; a mediation effect such that narcissism reduces psychopathy and Machiavellianism (Papageorgiou et al, ); symptoms of depression (Papageorgiou, Denovan, et al, ); and perceived stress (Papageorgiou, Gianniou, et al, ), through MT. This mediation model has also been tested using longitudinal data and showed that narcissism may increase MT resulting in higher school grades in an adolescent sample (Papageorgiou, Malanchini, et al, ).…”

“…However, other researchers have argued that grouping DT traits together may not be particularly informative (e.g., Papageorgiou, Wong, & Clough, ). In particular, several studies examining the association among narcissism and other traits, performance measures, and psychopathology symptoms (e.g., Ng, Cheung, & Tam, ; Onley, Veselka, Schermer, & Vernon, ; Papageorgiou et al, ; Papageorgiou, Malanchini, et al, ; Papageorgiou, Denovan, & Dagnall, ; Papageorgiou, Gianniou, et al, ; Petrides, Vernon, Schermer, & Veselka, ; Sabouri et al, ; Sedikides, Rudich, Gregg, Kumashiro, & Rusbult, ; Veselka, Schermer, & Vernon, ; Zeigler‐Hill & Besser, ) suggested that the inclusion of narcissism in the malevolent side of human personality may need to be reconsidered.…”

Country‐level correlates of the Dark Triad traits in 49 countries

“…We attempted to understand mean‐level differences and variance in sex differences as a function of a wide range of economic, political, and social factors around the world. We tested scarcity and liberalization hypotheses (Campbell & Żemojtel‐Piotrowska, 2017; Papageorgiou et al., 2019; Twenge & Campbell, 2010) in relation to country‐levels of the Dark Triad traits along with variance in the sex differences from country‐to‐country. The results were more consistent with the scarcity hypothesis.…”

“…Additionally, if personality traits are responses to local conditions, how should a trait like narcissism respond to different conditions? One hypothesis suggests that narcissism is created by a culture of indulgence or liberalization (Foster, Campbell, & Twenge, 2003; Miller et al., 2015; Twenge & Campbell, 2010), whereas an alternative view suggests that it might be created by scarcity (Campbell & Żemojtel‐Piotrowska, 2017; Papageorgiou et al., 2019). Regarding the latter view, in countries that are less developed, more corrupt, and have less economic freedom, peace, and gender equality, there is likely a greater degree of scarcity increasing competition for resources.…”

Psychometric Assessment of Shortened Mental Toughness Questionnaires (MTQ): Factor Structure of the MTQ-18 and the MTQ-10

“…In a general context, MT serves as an umbrella term to denote enabling psychological resources across a range of achievement contexts that promote positive mental health (Lin et al, 2017; Drinkwater et al, 2019; Papageorgiou et al, 2019a, b). Such universality can give rise to terminology that lacks a sound empirical basis, is theoretically vague, and contributes to conceptual obfuscation.…”