Who Falls in Love With a Narcissist? Testing Women’s Romantic Attraction Towards Fictional Male Characters

Abstract

The present research examined whether women’s narcissistic traits, thrill-seeking, impulsivity, and attachment style are associated with their level of attraction towards narcissistic men. Two trait dimensions of narcissism were distinguished: admiration (i.e., promoting oneself to gain admiration) and rivalry (i.e., devaluing others to protect one’s self-view). Participants (195 heterosexual women, Mage = 20.78, SD = 2.40) were asked to rate their level of attraction towards 25 pictures of fictional male characters who score relatively high or low on narcissism. Using multilevel modelling, we found that women were more attracted to men with high levels of narcissistic admiration (vs. low), and less attracted towards men with high scores on narcissistic rivalry (vs. low). We found no evidence that women who scored high on narcissism were more attracted to narcissistic men. Response surface analyses revealed that women who scored high on thrill-seeking (vs. low) were more attracted to narcissistic admiration, and to a lesser extent to narcissistic rivalry. Additionally, we discovered that women who scored high on impulsivity or avoidant attachment (vs. low) were (to a small extent) more attracted to narcissistic rivalry. Identifying women who are attracted to narcissistic men can help to implement and improve prevention or intervention programs related to narcissism in romantic relationships.