Narcissism and self-esteem reactivity: The role of negative achievement events

To examine the reactivity of narcissists to achievement and social events in their daily lives, 161 participants completed the Narcissistic Personality Inventory (Raskin & Hall, 1979) and daily diary measures of state self-esteem and daily experiences (i.e., positive achievement events, negative achievement events, positive social events, and negative social events). Multilevel random coefficient models found that narcissists reported greater decreases in their state self-esteem on days with more negative achievement events than was observed for non-narcissists. Narcissism did not moderate the associations observed for state self-esteem and the other daily events. These results suggest that narcissists may be especially reactive to mundane achievement failure experiences. The discussion will focus on the asymmetry in the reactivity of narcissists to daily events.