What is COVID-19 anyway? Narcissism and pandemic attitudes and behaviours

Abstract

Researchers have demonstrated relationships between dark personality traits (e.g., narcissism) and pandemic behaviours (e.g., disregard for public health interventions). Individuals who disregard public health measures risk spreading COVID-19 infection, which has important public health implications. The present study was designed to examine the relationship between narcissism and pandemic attitudes and behaviours using a large population representative sample of North American adults (N = 5812). Participants completed measures of narcissism, psychological entitlement, non-adherence to non-pharmaceutical public health interventions (NPI), COVID disregard, anti-vaccination attitudes, reasons for social distancing, and COVID stress. Results of MANOVA demonstrated that individuals with high levels of narcissism self-reported greater levels of non-adherence to NPI, COVID disregard, COVID stress, anti-vaccination attitudes, and psychological entitlement compared to those with low levels of narcissism. Further, men with high levels of narcissism self-reported greater levels of non-adherence to NPI, COVID disregard, COVID stress, and psychological entitlement, in comparison to women with high levels of narcissism. These findings provide a nuanced understanding of the relationship between narcissistic traits, sex, and pandemic attitudes and behaviours and have implications for tailoring pandemic-specific public health interventions based on individual difference variables.