title: A masked negative self-esteem? Implicit and explicit self-esteem in patients with Narcissistic Personality Disorder.
abstract: The mask model of narcissism states that the narcissistic traits of patients with NPD are the result of a compensatory reaction to underlying ego fragility. This model assumes that high explicit self-esteem masks low implicit self-esteem. However, research on narcissism has predominantly focused on non-clinical participants and data derived from patients diagnosed with Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) remain scarce. Therefore, the goal of the present study was to test the mask model hypothesis of narcissism among patients with NPD. Male patients with NPD were compared to patients with other PD's and healthy participants on implicit and explicit self-esteem. NPD patients did not differ in levels of explicit and implicit self-esteem compared to both the psychiatric and the healthy control group. Overall, the current study found no evidence in support of the mask model of narcissism among a clinical group. This implicates that it might not be relevant for clinicians to focus treatment of NPD on an underlying negative self-esteem.
authors.affiliation: Parnassia Group, PsyQ, Center for Personality disorders, The Hague, The Netherlands; Erasmus University Rotterdam, Institute of Psychology, Rotterdam, The Netherlands. Electronic address: marissen@fsw.eur.nl.
authors.forename: Marlies A E
authors.initials: MAE
authors.lastname: Marissen
authors.affiliation: Utrecht University, Clinical and Health Psychology, Utrecht, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Marlies E
authors.initials: ME
authors.lastname: Brouwer
authors.affiliation: Erasmus University Rotterdam, Institute of Psychology, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Annemarie M F
authors.initials: AMF
authors.lastname: Hiemstra
authors.affiliation: Leiden University, Institute of Psychology, Methodology and Statistics Unit, Leiden, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Mathijs L
authors.initials: ML
authors.lastname: Deen
authors.affiliation: Erasmus University Rotterdam, Institute of Psychology, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Ingmar H A
authors.initials: IHA
authors.lastname: Franken
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D004532:Ego; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009289:Narcissism; D010554:Personality Disorders / Q000523:psychology*; D010555:Personality Inventory; D012649:Self Concept
keywords: Mask model; Narcissism; Narcissistic Personality Inventory; Personality disorder; Treatment