How Does System Threat Affect Collective Narcissism?

Collective narcissism is a tendency to exaggerate an ingroup’s importance and desire for its external recognition.The core of this concept is a kind of dissatisfaction that the exceptionality of the ingroup is not fully appreciated by others.It is different from concepts such as collective self-esteem that belong to safe ingroup positivity.It is a concept that belongs to defensive ingroup positivity.According to the theoretical views from the representatives of the Frankfurt School,collective narcissism can satisfy the psychological needs of the weak ego,compensate for the deficiencies of the self,and even ease the dissatisfaction of the people.When collective narcissism is within a reasonable limit,it has some positivity.However,undue collective narcissism can produce a series of negative consequences.A number of studies have shown that collective narcissists are particularly sensitive to signs of threats to the status of their ingroup.They are very likely to form biased perceptions of intergroup conditions,and also tend to retaliate against those who provoke in reality or imagination the status or the image of their ingroup.Since the global financial crisis,the phenomenon of collective narcissism seems to be intensifying all over the world,not only hindering the process of globalization,but also exacerbating the tears and hostility between groups.Whether it is the election of Donald Trump as the president by the American people,the support of Brexit in Briton,or the rise of populism in Central and Eastern Europe,all of these are influenced by collective narcissism.During the onset of the COVID-19 epidemic,the domestic intergroup antagonism in public opinion has also emerged.Does this imply that Chinese people are also affected by collective narcissism to some extent?Moreover,how does system threat such as the COVID-19 epidemic affect collective narcissism?Looking back at the previous literature,we can find that domestic research on collective narcissism is almost absent,while foreign research on collective narcissism still has many questions that have not been fully explored.Interestingly,research on the situational factors affecting collective narcissism is rarely seen.To this end,this study proposes a hypothetical model of collective narcissism affected by system threat on the grounds of compensatory control theory and situational crisis communication theory,and carried out three studies(including 7 sub-studies),not only examining collective narcissism of the Chinese people,but also testing the hypothetical model in the context of the COVID-19 epidemic.Study 1 was a preliminary investigation of collective narcissism in China.Sub-study 1 used the large sample data from the Asian Barometer Survey to roughly look into the collective narcissism conditions and trends among people over 18 years old in China.The results suggest that the collective narcissism of the Chinese people may be at a medium to high level overall,and it has risen slightly in recent years.Moreover,rural residents have a slightly higher level of collective narcissism than urban residents.In addition,the older the age,or the lower the education level,the higher the level of collective narcissism.Sub-study 2 verified a Chinese version of the Collective Narcissism Scale in samples of college students and adults in the general population.The results also found that collective narcissism could significantly predict people’s perception of threats from outgroups and prejudice and hostility towards outgroups.Study 2 examined the mediation mechanism whereby the system threat of epidemic crisis affected collective narcissism.First,sub-study 3 used a survey to verify the parallel-dual-process model of system threat predicting collective narcissism through need for order(motivational path)and responsibility attribution(cognitive path).Then,sub-study 4,5,and 6 adopted the experimental causation chain design,and verified step by step the causality between variables in the model.The results consistently showed that the system threat of epidemic crisis could not only increase collective narcissism by increased personal need for order,but also reduce collective narcissism by increased responsibility attribution for the entire governmental system.Study 3 further explored the boundary condition of the above parallel dual mediation model.Here,sub-study 7 examined the moderating effect of system justifying belief on the above-mentioned parallel-dual-process model by a larger-sample survey(N=702).The results showed that system justifying belief could significantly moderate the latter half of each mediation path.For those who believed that the social system was less fair and legitimate,the positive effect of the need-for-order path and the negative effect of the responsibility-attribution path were both significant;for those who believed that the social system was more fair and legitimate,the effects of the need-for-order path and the responsibility-attribution path were not significant.These studies draw the following conclusions:System threat such as the COVID-19 epidemic can affect collective narcissism through the parallel dual mediation paths(i.e.,need for order and responsibility attribution)that have opposite effects;and the latter half of each of these two paths can be moderated by system justifying belief.Overall,these studies have some contributions.As far as theory is concerned,this research not only validates the views of compensatory control theory in the context of system threat affecting collective narcissism,but also expands the application scope of situational crisis communication theory.As far as reality is concerned,this research not only helps to make more people aware of collective narcissism and its potential negative consequences,thusly increasing the vigilance among citizens;it also helps to more comprehensively and deeply understand the impacts of system threat such as the epidemic crisis on people’s psychological outcomes,shedding some light for the government on how to unite people’s hearts more effectively in such crises.