Scientific article
English

Adult ADHD and pathological narcissism : A retrospective-analysis

Published inJournal of psychiatric research, vol. 174, p. 245-253
Publication date2024-06
First online date2024-04-21
Abstract

Adult attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is often associated with personality pathology. However, only few studies have been conducted on the link between ADHD and pathological narcissism (PN), with or without a diagnosis of narcissistic personality disorder (NPD). In order to fill this gap, PN and NPD were assessed in 164 subjects suffering from ADHD, with several other measures including ADHD severity, quality of life, depression, anxiety, impulsivity, and emotion dysregulation (ED). We found that a significant proportion of ADHD patients suffered from NPD, and that both narcissistic grandiosity and vulnerability were associated with ADHD hyperactivity and impulsivity symptoms, but not with inattentive symptoms. These two dimensions seemed to be negatively associated with well-being and positively associated with most of the other studied psychiatric dimensions except ED, the latter being only associated with vulnerability, even after adjustment on borderline symptoms. Overall, despite important limitations that limit the generalizability of our findings to the overall ADHD population (notably linked to selection bias), we believe that this exploratory study sheds light on the potential clinical relevance of narcissistic pathology in adult ADHD patients.

Keywords
  • ADHD
  • Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder
  • NPD
  • Narcissistic grandiosity
  • Narcissistic personality disorder
  • Narcissistic vulnerability
  • Pathological narcissism
  • Humans
  • Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity
  • Adult
  • Male
  • Female
  • Personality Disorders / epidemiology
  • Retrospective Studies
  • Narcissism
  • Psychiatric Status Rating Scales
  • Young Adult
  • Middle Aged
  • Quality of Life
  • Impulsive Behavior / physiology
  • Narcissistic Personality Disorder
Citation (ISO format)
DUARTE, Miguel et al. Adult ADHD and pathological narcissism : A retrospective-analysis. In: Journal of psychiatric research, 2024, vol. 174, p. 245–253. doi: 10.1016/j.jpsychires.2024.04.032
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Article (Published version)
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Identifiers
Journal ISSN0022-3956
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Creation10/09/2024 10:02:02
First validation02/10/2024 07:54:01
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