Narcissism, a trait considered obnoxious in most circumstances, actually pays off big-time in the short-term context of a job interview, according to a new study to be published in the Journal of Applied Social Psychology<\/em>.<\/p>\n Narcissists scored much higher in simulated job interviews than non-narcissists, researchers found. They pointed to narcissists\u2019 innate tendency to promote themselves, in part by engaging and speaking at length, which implied confidence and expertise even when they were held to account by expert interviewers<\/strong>.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is one setting where it\u2019s OK to say nice things about yourself and there are no ramifications. In fact, it\u2019s expected,\u201d said Peter Harms, assistant professor of management at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and a co-author of the study. \u201cSimply put, those who are comfortable doing this tend to do much better than those who aren\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n The two-part study examined the effectiveness of the types of behaviors that narcissists exhibit \u2013 which would be typically seen as maladjusted \u2013 in the narrow context of an interview. In the first part, 72 participants were videotaped in a simulated job-applicant setting. As expected narcissists were more likely to self-promote; however, it was when expert interviewers challenged applicants that narcissists started behaving in unexpected ways, Harms said.<\/p>\n While normal individuals backed off of their self-promotion tactics when held accountable, narcissists actually increased their attempts to make themselves look better<\/strong>.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen feeling challenged, they tend to double down,\u201d Harms said. \u201cIt\u2019s as if they say \u2018Oh, you\u2019re going to challenge me? Then I\u2019m not just great, I\u2019m fantastic.\u2019 And in this setting, it tended to work.\u201d<\/p>\n In the study\u2019s second part, 222 raters evaluated videos of applicants with similar job skills and varying levels of narcissism. The raters consistently awarded chronic self-promoters \u2013 who spoke quickly and at length and who used ingratiation tactics such as smiling, gesturing and complimenting others \u2013 far more positive evaluations.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, equally qualified applicants who tended to rely on tactical modesty scored lower, according to the study.<\/p>\n \u201cThis shows that what is getting (narcissists) the win is the delivery,\u201d Harms said. \u201cThese results show just how hard it is to effectively interview, and how fallible we can be when making interview judgments. We don\u2019t necessarily want to hire narcissists, but might end up doing so because they come off as being self-confident and capable.\u201d<\/p>\n For interviewers, the study\u2019s findings mean they must become aware of the tactics used by narcissists<\/strong>, Harms said \u2013 and, if necessary, avoid selecting people who chronically use self-promotion and ingratiation, unless those behaviors are appropriate for the position<\/strong>.<\/p>\n \u201cOn the whole, we find very little evidence that narcissists are more or less effective workers. But what we do know is that they can be very disruptive and destructive when dealing with other people on a regular basis. If everything else is equal, it probably is best to avoid hiring them.\u201d<\/p>\n In addition to UNL\u2019s Harms, the study was authored by Delroy L. Paulhus, Bryce G. Westlake and Stryker S. Calvez of the University of British Columbia.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" From the University of Nebraska-Lincoln press release via Newswise: The secret to excelling in a job interview may not hinge on how much your interviewers like you, but in how… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[8],"tags":[181,270,32,12,102],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2201"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2201"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2201\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2203,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2201\/revisions\/2203"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2201"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2201"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2201"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"http:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/images\/blogpics\/Narcissism.jpg\" "\\"narcissism\\"")
The secret to excelling in a job interview may not hinge on how much your interviewers like you, but in how much you like yourself<\/strong>.<\/p>\n