Scientists Just Figured Out Something Fascinating About Narcissistic Men and Gossip

The old adage "there's no such thing as bad publicity" seems to apply perfectly to narcissistic men, who in a series of studies were found to be strikingly open to being trash-talked.

As PsyPost flagged, a new study conducted by psychological researchers at Duke, the University of Mississippi, and the University Kaiserslautern-Landau in Germany not only found that men were generally more open to being gossiped about than women, but also that narcissistic men in particular were even more accepting of it — even if the gossip was negative.

Published in the journal Self and Identity, the study involved a series of phases in which 400 college student participants, recruited through online platforms, discussed at length how they felt about four types of gossip: negative, positive, neutral/ambiguous, or not mentioned at all.

As examples, the paper provided a party scenario in which, after attendees leave, the people left begin to speak about them — except in the "not mentioned" situation, naturally — either affirmatively, derogatorily, or ambiguously.

During the study, participants were also asked to rate on a scale from one to seven how much they agree with the statement "I am a narcissist," with one being the lowest and seven being the highest. While it seems somewhat counterintuitive to ask that kind of question outright, research suggests that narcissists are aware of their narcissism — and some, per this study at least, seem willing to admit it.

Later, the participants' responses were analyzed more comprehensively using the classic Narcissistic Personality Inventory questionnaire to better assess just how narcissistic they really were.

After analyzing their participants' responses, the researchers found that although most people don't want to be gossiped about, 64 percent of the cohort overall said they'd prefer to be gossiped about positively than to not be spoken about at all. The narcissists, meanwhile, were more willing to be discussed in each gossip condition — and, fascinatingly, seemed to slightly prefer being gossiped about negatively, ambiguously, or not at all over being discussed in a positive light.

As the researchers wrote in the paper, "men and individuals higher in narcissism... seem to have a stronger desire for attention, even if it is negative."

"Based on these findings, it follows that contemplating a world where others have nothing to say about you — good or bad — may also be aversive," the paper concluded. "It is reasonable to expect that gossip has the potential to, if nothing else, affirm one’s social significance, and may therefore be favored by some."

More on narcissists: Elon Musk Says He Has No Idea What He Did to Make Everybody So Mad at Him

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