PLOS ONE RESEARCH ARTICLE The anxious addictive narcissist: The relationship between grandiose and vulnerable narcissism, anxiety symptoms and Facebook Addiction 1 2 2 1 Julia BrailovskaiaID *, Elke Rohmann , Hans-Werner Bierhoff , JuÈ rgen MargrafID 1 Mental Health Research and Treatment Center, Department of Clinical Psychology and Psychotherapy, Ruhr-UniversitaÈt Bochum, Bochum, Germany, 2 Department of Social Psychology, Ruhr-UniversitaÈt Bochum, Bochum, Germany a1111111111 a1111111111 *
[email protected] a1111111111 a1111111111 a1111111111 Abstract Vulnerable narcissism and grandiose narcissism share the core of the narcissistic self but are considered as separate forms of this personality trait. While previous research mainly focused on the mechanisms that connect grandiose narcissism and addictive use of the OPEN ACCESS social platform Facebook, it remained unclear why individuals with enhanced levels of vul- Citation: Brailovskaia J, Rohmann E, Bierhoff H-W, nerable narcissism are at risk to develop Facebook Addiction (FA). The present study inves- Margraf J (2020) The anxious addictive narcissist: The relationship between grandiose and vulnerable tigated the links between vulnerable and grandiose narcissism, anxiety symptoms, and FA. narcissism, anxiety symptoms and Facebook In a sample of 327 Facebook users (age: M(SD) = 23.67(3.96), range: 18±56), both forms of Addiction. PLoS ONE 15(11): e0241632. https:// narcissism were positively related to anxiety symptoms and FA. Moreover, the association doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0241632 between both forms of narcissism and FA was partly mediated by anxiety symptoms. Editor: Kenji Hashimoto, Chiba Daigaku, JAPAN Results enter new territory by revealing hidden similarities between vulnerable and grandi- Received: June 6, 2020 ose narcissists, emphasizing that similar mechanisms might explain their enhanced risk to Accepted: October 18, 2020 develop addictive tendencies of Facebook use.