Narcissism Predicts Support for Hierarchy (At Least When Narcissists Think They Can Rise to the Top)
Abstract
Five studies tested the relationship between narcissism and support for hierarchy. Narcissism was associated with endorsing group-based hierarchy, income inequality, and hierarchy in business (Studies 1a–1b) and with liking organizations with a hierarchical structure (Studies 2a–2b). Analyses suggested that more narcissistic participants’ preference for a hierarchy may have been due at least partly to their current high standing in that hierarchy (Studies 1a–1b) or their expectation that they will rise in rank (Studies 2a–2b). When participants learned about an organization where it was possible or impossible to rise in rank, there was a positive relationship between narcissism and support for hierarchy if it was possible to rise in rank, whereas the same relationship was negative if it was not possible to rise in rank (Study 3). These studies provide evidence consistent with the idea that narcissistic individuals prefer hierarchies because they are or think they will be on the top.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
Narcissists have been shown to choose hierarchical over egalitarian settings, provided they can gain status in these settings.
“Second, narcissists have been shown to choose hierarchical over egalitarian settings, provided they can gain status in these settings (Alba, McIlwain, Wheeler, & Jones, 2014; Zitek & Jordan, 2016).”
From The "Why" and "How" of Narcissism: A Process Model of Narcissistic Status Pursuit (2020) · cites this paper as Zitek & Jordan, 2016
Cites
The dark triad of personality: Narcissism, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy
Paulhus, D. L., & Williams, K. M. (2002) · Journal of Research in Personality · doi:10.1016/s0092-6566(02)00505-6 · Cited by 5,265 · cited 1× · see citing works
“This allowed us to examine extroversion, agreeableness, and openness to experience, personality characteristics that are associated with narcissism (Paulhus & Williams, 2002).”
Background8 Social Hierarchy: The Self‐Reinforcing Nature of Power and Status
Magee, J. C., & Galinsky, A. D. (2008) · Academy of Management Annals · doi:10.5465/19416520802211628 · Cited by 2,385 · see citing works
Rosenthal, S. A., & Pittinsky, T. L. (2006) · The Leadership Quarterly · doi:10.1016/j.leaqua.2006.10.005 · Cited by 937 · see citing works
Narcissism, Self-Esteem, and the Positivity of Self-Views: Two Portraits of Self-Love
Campbell, W. K., Rudich, E. A., & Sedikides, C. (2002) · Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin · doi:10.1177/0146167202286007 · Cited by 866 · see citing works
The psychology of system justification and the palliative function of ideology
Jost, J., & Hunyady, O. (2003) · European Review of Social Psychology · doi:10.1080/10463280240000046 · Cited by 833 · see citing works
Leader emergence: the case of the narcissistic leader.
Brunell, A. B., Gentry, W. A., Campbell, W. K., Hoffman, B. J., Kuhnert, K. W., & DeMarree, K. G. (2008) · Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin · doi:10.1177/0146167208324101 · Cited by 516 · see citing works
Narcissistic Illusions in Self‐Evaluations of Intelligence and Attractiveness
Gabriel, M. T., Critelli, J. W., & Ee, J. S. (1994) · Journal of Personality · doi:10.1111/j.1467-6494.1994.tb00798.x · Cited by 478 · cited 2× · see citing works
“Narcissists did not perform better on the test of academic skills in Study 2a, and other research has revealed that highly narcissistic people are no more skilled than others in characteristics such as creativity (Goncalo, Flynn, & Kim, 2010), leadership ability (Grijalva, Harms, Newman, Gaddis, & Fraley, 2015), and i…”
BackgroundGoncalo, J. A., Flynn, F. J., & Kim, S. H. (2010) · Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin · doi:10.1177/0146167210385109 · Cited by 312 · see citing works
Flagged first, then by citations
Cited by
Sorted by citations
The "Why" and "How" of Narcissism: A Process Model of Narcissistic Status Pursuit
Grapsas, S., Brummelman, E., Back, M. D., & Denissen, J. J. A. (2020) · Perspectives on Psychological Science · doi:10.1177/1745691619873350 · Cited by 312 · see citing works
“Second, narcissists have been shown to choose hierarchical over egalitarian settings, provided they can gain status in these settings (Alba, McIlwain, Wheeler, & Jones, 2014; Zitek & Jordan, 2016).”
Background
- Authors
- Zitek, E. M., & Jordan, A. H.
- Affiliations
- Cornell University (US)
- Boston University (US)
- Corresponding author
- Zitek, Emily M.
- Venue
- Social Psychological and Personality Science
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2016-06-22
- Volume
- 7
- Issue
- 7
- Pages
- 707-716
- ISSN
- 1948-5506 (ISSN-L)
- 1948-5514
- OpenAlex
- W2405829382
- Cited by
- 67
- References
- 8
- Citations by year
- 2026: 7 · 2025: 3 · 2024: 7 · 2023: 8 · 2022: 5 · 2021: 6 · 2020: 8 · 2019: 6 · 2018: 12 · 2017: 5
- FWCI
- 10.28
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Social Psychological and Personality Science (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Personality Traits and Psychology
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Social and Intergroup Psychology
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Social Power and Status Dynamics
- Keywords
- narcissism, hierarchy, social status, income inequality, organizational structure, group hierarchy, self-promotion
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
