Parents who overvalue kids may help create little narcissists: study

Children who are overvalued by their parents are more likely to grow up to be selfish little narcissists, scientists said Monday.

In a study published in the U.S. journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers found children who were described by their parents as "more special than other children" and as kids who "deserve something extra in life" tended to score higher on narcissism tests.

"Children believe it when their parents tell them that they are more special than others," study author Brad Bushman, professor of communication and psychology at the Ohio State University, said in a statement. "That may not be good for them or for society."

Lead author Eddie Brummelman, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Amsterdam in the Netherlands said parents who overvalue their children may think that will help boost their self- esteem but the results are always the opposite.

"Rather than raising self-esteem, overvaluing practices may inadvertently raise levels of narcissism," Brummelman said.

Narcissism can induce aggressive behaviors and an increased risk of mental health problems. Two opposing theories of narcissistic origins exist: one proposes that children develop narcissistic traits when their parents overvalue them, while the other proposes that narcissistic traits emerge in children whose parents fail to express warmth toward them.

The new study was based on four surveys of 565 children in the Netherlands who were seven to 11 years old when the study began, and their parents, each six months apart.

Parental overvaluation of children was measured with a scale that asked moms and dads how much they agreed with statements such as "My child is a great example for other children to follow."

Both children and parents reported how much emotional warmth parents showed, with participants indicating how much they agreed with statements like "I let my child know I love him/her" or "My father/mother lets me know he/she loves me."

The children were then measured for levels of both narcissism and self-esteem.

The researchers found that parental overvaluation was associated with higher levels of child narcissism over time while parents who showed more emotional warmth tended to have children with higher self-esteem.

"Overvaluation predicted narcissism, not self-esteem, whereas warmth predicted self-esteem, not narcissism," Bushman said. " People with high self-esteem think they're as good as others, whereas narcissists think they're better than others."

Parental overvaluation, however, is not the only cause of narcissism in children, the researchers noted, adding that genetics and the temperamental traits of the children themselves also have an effect.

Bushman, who is a father of three children, said his research on narcissism "has changed my parenting style."

"When I first started doing this research in the 1990s, I used to think my children should be treated like they were extra- special. I'm careful not to do that now," he said. Endite