Grandiose Narcissists’ Public Versus Private Attributions for a Collaborative Success

Abstract

Grandiose narcissists tend to exhibit stronger self-serving attributional biases (SSABs) and seek public recognition for accomplishments. We examined whether grandiose narcissists are especially self-serving regarding a team success when making attributions publicly versus privately, and whether this depends on whether their partner is a friend or stranger. College students imagined winning a contest involving collaboration with a partner (friend/stranger), and then distributed credit and monetary reward for the team’s success in an imagined public (“TV interview”) or private (“anonymous survey”) context. Participants higher in grandiose narcissism exhibited greater SSAB when partnered with a stranger than a friend, especially when making attributions for earned monetary award in a “public” context. In contrast, participants lower in narcissism did not exhibit SSAB in any experiment condition. In fact, they exhibited a partner-favoring bias (in monetary reward allocations) in the “public” context when partnered with a stranger. Implications for real world reward distributions are discussed.