I was raised in a household that revolved around my mother. She was a narcissist, someone who, according to Wendy Behary, director of the Cognitive Therapy Center of New Jersey and author of Disarming the Narcissist: Surviving and Thriving with the Self-Absorbed is "often self-absorbed and preoccupied with a need to achieve the perfect image (recognition, status, or being envied) and have little or no capacity for listening, caring, or understanding the needs of others." My mom hasn't been formally diagnosed—few narcissists seek treatment or even recognize that they have a problem—but growing up, the signs … Read More

It's no secret that people are getting married later these days than in previous generations, and in this culture of hook-ups and "modern female dating anxiety," we're at no loss for theories that explain why. Some people say today's twentysomethings are delaying marriage to focus on careers and build close friendships instead, but another explanation paints a less flattering picture of young people: apparently, they're all just a bunch of narcissists. In an article on The Daily Beast this week, writer Hannah Seligson, explores this theory, writing: "narcissism, even in small doses, has shifted courtship into a high-stakes relationship … Read More

Ever since John Edwards explained away his affair with Rielle Hunter, saying, "I started to believe that I was special and became increasing egocentric", we've been thinking about how it is just SUCH a dealbreaker to date a guy who's a narcissist. After all, who wants to end up in a bitter divorce battle like Christie Brinkley, whose ex-husband, Peter Cook, (who admitted to lying and cheating) was diagnosed as narcissistic by a court psychiatrist during their publicized divorce trial proceedings. But how do you tell if a person is a narcissist before you get caught up in their web … Read More

Being called "narcissistic"—stemming from the Greek mythical character Narcissus who fell in love with his own reflection—isn't necessarily the most flowery of compliments. One automatically thinks of the guy who uses a spoon to gaze at his reflection during brunch, or the chick who can't bear to leave the house without a throng of male admirers—or any other combination of self-bloated annoyingness. Throw a rock hard enough and you'll find one (or twenty).

On an even deeper level, a Narcissistic Personality Disorder is described by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders as … Read More

If you're a narcissist, your Facebook profile probably shows it.

University of Georgia researchers used personality questionnaires to determine 130 Facebook users' levels of narcissism, then showed the profiles to strangers. Based on a user's number of friends, level of attractiveness and degree of self-promotion in the main photo, the strangers were able to pinpoint the narcissists with a high degree of accuracy.

Besides seeming awfully harsh to the beautiful, popular, and ever-photogenic non-narcissists out there—a group that stereotypes so often and cruelly beat down—the findings are slightly hard to believe. So, my Facebook profile picture isn't the … Read More

We've been around the block. We've seen enough political figures dropping trou to, if not yawn at the John Edwards scandal, then to certainly not be surprised by it. We've learned that even those politicians with an upstanding rep, adorable kids, and a kick-ass wife—maybe even especially those—seem to stray. The thing we've yet to uncover, though, is why.

We get the human nature thing. A USA Today/Gallup poll conducted in March of this year — right after the Eliot Spitzer scandal broke — found that 54 percent of Americans know someone with an unfaithful spouse. We're no math … Read More