When you notice narcissistic tendencies in your child, you may want to look at what you’re doing wrong first.
A new study has found that children whose parents give them too much praise or overvalue them tend to develop narcissistic traits, including superiority and entitlement, according to CNN News.
Continuing to praise a child for their non-accomplishments, may unintentionally create an ego that is too big for anyone to handle, a side-effect that everyone around the child will have to deal with in the future.
“People with high self-esteem think they’re as good as others, whereas narcissists think they’re better than others,” stated co-author of the study Brad Bushman.
He continued, “Children believe it when their parents tell them that are more special than others. That may not be good for them or for society.”
The recent study reportedly involved 565 children in the Netherlands between the ages of 7 and 12, which is around the time kids are able to compare themselves to others. Researchers reportedly asked parents how smart they thought their children were and then measured the children’s actual IQs.
“And what we found was that parents who overvalue, they think their child is very smart but in reality, the child isn’t smarter than others,” stated Eddie Brummelman, one of the study’s co-authors and a postdoctoral researcher at the Research Institute of Child Development and Education at the University of Amsterdam.
Parents who are feeding into their children’s narcissism may be doing much more harm to their kids’ futures than they think, according to Forbes.
“Narcissistic children feel superior to others, believe they are entitled to privileges, and crave for constant admiration from others,” stated Brummelman.
He continued, “When they fail to obtain the admiration they want, they may lash out aggressively. Narcissistic individuals are also at increased risk to develop addiction. Subgroups of narcissists, especially those with low self-esteem, are at increased risk to develop anxiety and depression.”