Is My Parent Narcissistic? Retrospective Perceptions of the Adult Child on Their Parent’s Narcissistic Tendencies

Narcissism development in children has been a widely studied subject; however, little research has examined parental narcissism. Previous researchers found that parental narcissism is related to non-ideal parent-child bonds, which often results in parents having low senses of well-being and satisfaction with their bond (Hart et al., 2017; Horton, 2021). For each of our studies, we explored how aspects of an individual’s growth and development are linked with parental narcissism as recalled by adult children. In Study 1, we investigated the link between both recalled grandiose and vulnerable parental narcissism and the mental well-being and self-esteem of our participants. In this study, we found that recalled vulnerable narcissism was linked to lower rates of self-esteem and well-being, while recalled grandiose narcissism was not correlated with either. In Study 2, we examined parenting styles, where we discovered that both subtypes were linked to maladaptive parenting styles known as rejection and overprotection. In our final study, we analyzed the attachment styles of the adult child and found that both parental narcissism subtypes were linked to avoidant and anxious attachment. Our studies identified the negative effects that both subtypes have on the development of the adult child, ultimately indicating that vulnerable narcissism is the more substandard subtype.