Measures of Narcissistic Behavior in Social Media Social media has been used throughout generations as a method for those far away from each other to stay connected through the use of technology. With social media, participants share things that interest them, share photos about what they are involved in, and also are able to stay updated on what their “friends” are doing day to day. While social media is a great tool for these things, it can be abused and used in inappropriate ways by those seeking personal attention to boost their self-esteem. The Narcissism Personality Inventory (Raskin & Terry, 1988) was invented in 1977 and was used to measure the narcissistic trait based on the DSM-III criteria for narcissistic personality disorder.
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Ackerman (2011) later decided that the NPI was only testing three main aspects to the narcissistic trait, and the test was then split into three different measures. The Grandiose Exhibitionism (GE) scale is predicted to measure self-promotional behavior and the Entitlement/Exploitativeness (EE) scale is predicted to measure anti-social behavior. The third measure looks at the aspect of leadership in prosocial behaviors. In the original study, Carpenter (2012) predicted that human traits such as narcissism could be measured by observing people’s behaviors on social media. Ackerman (2013) defined narcissist behavior as a sense of superiority, grandiosity, and self-absorption, along with exhibitionism, envy, exploitativeness, and instability in mood. Carpenter believed that the narcissistic trait that humans have are a good predictor for anti-social behavior on Facebook, specifically. His hypothesis stated that there would be a strong positive correlation between GE and EE scores and …show more content…
The surveys consisted of a social media questionnaire that asked students about the frequency of certain social media behaviors and their beliefs about their usage on social media. After the questionnaire, the participants filled out the NPI consisting of the GE and EE subscales. Self promoting behavior (positively associated with GE) was indicated by the results of the questions that asked about the participants and their activity frequency of posting on social media about self, posting photos of oneself, updating social media profiles, how often profile pictures are changed, how often they are tagged in photos, accepting friend/follower requests from strangers, and the privacy settings on the profile. For example, one of the questions asked how often the participant posts a status update to social media. The participant was able to answer on a scale from never to always/every day/more than once a day. Antisocial behavior (associated with EE) was indicated by the results of the questions that asked about the participants and their frequency of retaliating against someone on social media for a mean comment, indirectly posting about someone on social media, checking how many likes on a photo or post, checking for comments responding to their own, checking for posts about themself, posting whenever something is bothering them, and commenting about being upset. For example, one of the questions used to
Ackerman (2011) later decided that the NPI was only testing three main aspects to the narcissistic trait, and the test was then split into three different measures. The Grandiose Exhibitionism (GE) scale is predicted to measure self-promotional behavior and the Entitlement/Exploitativeness (EE) scale is predicted to measure anti-social behavior. The third measure looks at the aspect of leadership in prosocial behaviors. In the original study, Carpenter (2012) predicted that human traits such as narcissism could be measured by observing people’s behaviors on social media. Ackerman (2013) defined narcissist behavior as a sense of superiority, grandiosity, and self-absorption, along with exhibitionism, envy, exploitativeness, and instability in mood. Carpenter believed that the narcissistic trait that humans have are a good predictor for anti-social behavior on Facebook, specifically. His hypothesis stated that there would be a strong positive correlation between GE and EE scores and …show more content…
The surveys consisted of a social media questionnaire that asked students about the frequency of certain social media behaviors and their beliefs about their usage on social media. After the questionnaire, the participants filled out the NPI consisting of the GE and EE subscales. Self promoting behavior (positively associated with GE) was indicated by the results of the questions that asked about the participants and their activity frequency of posting on social media about self, posting photos of oneself, updating social media profiles, how often profile pictures are changed, how often they are tagged in photos, accepting friend/follower requests from strangers, and the privacy settings on the profile. For example, one of the questions asked how often the participant posts a status update to social media. The participant was able to answer on a scale from never to always/every day/more than once a day. Antisocial behavior (associated with EE) was indicated by the results of the questions that asked about the participants and their frequency of retaliating against someone on social media for a mean comment, indirectly posting about someone on social media, checking how many likes on a photo or post, checking for comments responding to their own, checking for posts about themself, posting whenever something is bothering them, and commenting about being upset. For example, one of the questions used to