With each new generation, Americans are growing more narcissistic. That assertion, which has been backed up by research, has spread widely, presumably because it makes intuitive sense. It’s easy to surmise that growing up in a world of selfies and social media would lead kids to worship their own reflections.
However, this narrative has been challenged. And just-published research suggests it may be based on a misreading, or misinterpretation, of some widely cited data.
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“There may never have been an epidemic of narcissism,” writes a team led by psychologists Eunike Wetzel of the University of Konstanz and Brent Roberts of the University of Illinois–Urbana-Champaign. “Our study suggests today’s college students are less narcissistic than their predecessors.”