Narcissists Facing Social Media Feedback: Activated Emotions and Subsequent Aggressive and Prosocial Behaviors

Abstract

The appraisal-oriented Status Pursuit in Narcissism (SPIN) model suggests that narcissists show rivalry-oriented behavior when they lack social affirmation, but behave prosocially when admired. Aiming to integrate emotional responses into this perspective, this study investigated whether narcissistic rage and pride accounted for narcissists' direct and displaced aggression and prosociality following social feedback. Participants (N = 371) experienced either Low Social Validation or High Social Validation in a simulated social media context. After reporting their emotions, they sent “Dislikes” and “Likes” to either the Same Peers (i.e., direct responses) who had given social feedback or to Different Peers (i.e., displaced responses). Results showed that narcissistic rivalry predicted more narcissistic rage following Low Social Validation, which subsequently predicted more “Dislikes” and fewer “Likes” toward both Same Peers and Different Peers. Narcissistic admiration predicted both more “Dislikes” and more “Likes” via pride across social feedback and peer group conditions. This study suggests that narcissistic rage stemming from narcissistic rivalry accounts for aggression following social failures, while pride stemming from narcissistic admiration accounts for prosociality regardless of social feedback experiences.