10 Ways Narcissists and Alcoholics Are Similar
When narcissists do not receive the admiration they crave, such as through criticism, indifference or disrespect, they exhibit significant distress. This is where the narcissist and addiction often intersect, in a place where their self-perception is challenged. People with narcissistic personality disorders share similar traits with addicts, and both types of narcissistic personality disorder may lead to addiction. A 2020 review of research on narcissism and substance use disorders concludes that low self-esteem that requires external validation from others can increase the risk of substance use disorders. It also highlights that a lack of empathy toward others and feelings of invulnerability allow people to continue the problematic use of drugs, despite the obvious damage they cause to the individual and the people around them.
What Is Cognitive Empathy?
People with communal narcissism see themselves as more empathetic, caring, or selfless than others and often display moral outrage. They’re often overly focused on status, wealth, flattery, and power due to their grandiosity and sense of entitlement. Overt narcissists may be high-achieving and deeply sensitive to criticism, no matter how slight. Don’t try to make them see a long line of behavior dating back years – or how they’re just like their father, for example, Perlin says.
Narcissism and Drug Addiction – What Happens When Two Disorders Meet
A narcissistic person may exhibit grandiosity or a sense of superiority. They may believe that they’re entitled to special treatment, favors, praise, or admiration from others. Antagonistic narcissism is defined by a sense of competitiveness, arrogance, and rivalry. While all people with narcissistic traits can be overly concerned with how they appear to others, antagonistic narcissists are particularly concerned with coming out “on top.” They include overt narcissism, covert narcissism, antagonistic narcissism, communal narcissism, and malignant narcissism.
Ways Narcissists and Alcoholics Are Similar
- It’s possible to live with traits of narcissism or any personality disorder without becoming abusive.
- Regardless, a mental health diagnosis never excuses abusive behavior.
- The Dark Triad of personality—narcissism, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy (1)—attracted enormous research interest in the past decades.
- It is normal for people to become overly proud of themselves on occasion, but it is an entirely different problem if they have narcissistic personality disorder.
- Our team of addiction professionals uses evidence-based techniques to help you achieve the best possible solution.
Not narcissism and alcoholism every person suffering from this mental health disorder will display all of these traits. Narcissistic personality disorder can present itself differently from person to person. The similarities between narcissism and drug addiction are that the individual depends on something external to fill the emptiness inside.
Narcissistic personality disorder
- The authors of the review also suggest that people with narcissism may use drugs to achieve a state of superiority above others while also lessening feelings of inferiority, which fluctuating self-esteem can cause.
- The two types can have common traits but come from different childhood experiences.
- The person then seeks out alcohol or substances to mediate these feelings, leading to more feelings of shame, and so on.
- The similarities between narcissism and drug addiction are that the individual depends on something external to fill the emptiness inside.
A narcissistic personality disorder causes problems in many areas of life, such as relationships, work, school or financial matters. People with narcissistic personality disorder may be generally unhappy and disappointed when they’re not given the special favors or admiration that they believe they deserve. They may find their relationships troubled and unfulfilling, and other people may not enjoy being around them. Narcissistic abuse syndrome is a non-medical term for feelings of anxiety, avoidance, and fear due to emotional abuse from someone with narcissistic personality disorder (NPD). Structural models of narcissism place self-importance and entitlement—both aspects of antagonism—at the core of the construct (15, 16). Beyond that, a grandiose form, a socially dominant, agentic–antagonistic interpersonal style, and a vulnerable form, a neurotic–antagonistic style, can be distinguished (16).
