Search results for: narcissism

Authors: Christine Mappala

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Social Networking Sites has an undeniable contribution but also a downgrading effect in our society when used inappropriately. It has effects on an individual’s physical, academic, social, emotional, and behavioral aspects in life, a reason to take account to the possible risks it can have with the future generations, specifically the Generation Z. Determining if SNS Usage has an effect on an individual’s Narcissistic Tendencies, how common narcissism is among these individuals and to provide additional information about the Generation Z in the Philippines is the purpose of this study. A total of 342 participants were gathered. Results indicated that there is a low significance of SNS as a predictor to Narcissism. Also, results showed that there is a low level of narcissism among Generation Z.

Keywords: narcissism, social networking sites, Generation Z, normal narcissism

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Authors: Jaskarn Singh Sidhu

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The present study investigated the relationship of Empathy and Narcissism among university sports persons. Sample-The sample of the study consists of a total of 248 sportspersons and non-sports persons. Tools- To evaluate empathy, a 16-scale questionnaire was used and to evaluate narcissism, NPI-16 questionnaire was used. Statically-Two-Way Analysis of Variance used to analyse the data collected to establish the relationship. Results- In empathy male champion players shows more empathy than female counterparts the results also reveals that non champion females showed more empathy than non-champion male sports persons. In totality champion shows more empathy than non- champions. Results of Narcissism revealed that male champion sports persons were high on Narcissism scale then female counterparts. Non -champion males also indicate high narcissism then non champion female sports persons indicating female were less self -oriented then male sports persons. Conclusion- From the results it was concluded that no significant difference exists among sports persons in empathy and narcissism with reference to gender and sports performance.

Keywords: champion, narcissism, empathy, non champion players

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Authors: Isil Coklar-Okutkan, Miray Akyunus

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Victim sensitivity is a form of justice sensitivity that reflects the tendency to perceive injustice to one’s disadvantage. Victim sensitivity is considered as a dysfunctional trait that predicts anger, aggression, uncooperative behavior, depression and anxiety. Indeed, exploring the mechanism of association between victim sensitivity and anger is clinically important since it can lead to externalizing and internalizing problems. This study aims to investigate the moderating role of pathological narcissism in the relationship between victim sensitivity and anger rumination. Through testing different models where subtypes of narcissism and anger rumination components are included independently, the specific mechanism of different ruminative processes in anger is investigated. The sample consisted of 311 undergraduate students from Turkey, 107 of whom were males, and 204 were females. Participants completed Justice Sensitivity Inventory-Victim Subscale, Pathological Narcissism Inventory and Anger Rumination Scale. In the proposed double moderation model, vulnerable and grandiose narcissism was the moderators in the relationship between victim justice sensitivity and anger rumination. Four separate models were tested where one of the four components of anger rumination (angry afterthoughts, thoughts of revenge, angry memories, understanding of causes) were the dependent variable in each model. Results revealed that two of the moderation models are significant. Firstly, grandiose narcissism is the only moderator in the relationship between victim sensitivity and thoughts of revenge. Secondly, vulnerable narcissism is the only moderator in the relationship between victim sensitivity and understanding causes. Accordingly, grandiose narcissism is positively associated with the thoughts of revenge, and vulnerable narcissism is positively associated with understanding causes, only when the level of victim sensitivity is high. To summarize, increased victim sensitivity leads to ruminative thoughts of revenge in individuals with grandiose narcissism, whereas it leads to rumination on causes of the incident in individuals with vulnerable narcissism. The clinical implications of the findings are discussed.

Keywords: anger rumination, victim sensitivity, grandiose narcissism, vulnerable narcissism

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Authors: Amber Dummett, Efstathia Tzemou

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Narcissism is a personality trait characterized by selfishness, entitlement, and superiority. Narcissism is split into two subtypes, grandiose narcissism (GN) and vulnerable narcissism (VN). Grandiose narcissists are extraverted and arrogant, while vulnerable narcissists are introverted and insecure. This study investigates the psychological mechanisms that lead to differences in academic achievement (AA) between grandiose and vulnerable narcissists, specifically the mediating effects of self-esteem and self-efficacy. While narcissism is considered to be a negative trait, one of the Dark Triads, GN, has been found to have some benefits; therefore, this study considers if better AA is one of them. Moreover, further research into VN is essential to fully compare and contrast it with GN. We hypothesize that grandiose narcissists achieve higher marks due to having high self-esteem and self-efficacy. In comparison, we hypothesize that vulnerable narcissists underperform and achieve lower marks due to having low self-esteem and self-efficacy. Two online surveys were distributed to undergraduate university students. The first was a collection of scales measuring the mentioned dimensions and semester one AA, and the second investigated end of year AA. Sequential mediation analyses were conducted using the gathered data. Our analysis shows that neither self-esteem nor self-efficacy mediates the relationship between GN and AA. GN positively predicts self-esteem but has no relationship with self-efficacy. Self-esteem does not mediate the relationship between VN and AA. VN has a negative indirect effect on AA via self-efficacy, and VN negatively predicts self-esteem. Self-efficacy positively predicts AA. GN does not affect AA through the mediation of self-esteem and then self-efficacy, and neither does VN in this way. Overall, having grandiose or vulnerable narcissistic traits does not affect students’ AA. However, being highly efficacious does lead to academic success; therefore, universities should employ methods to improve the self-efficacy of their students.

Keywords: academic achievement, grandiose narcissism, self-efficacy, self-esteem, vulnerable narcissism

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Authors: Weronika Molińska, Joanna Rajchert

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A musical career is not only about the quality of performing or playing music. Musicians can choose from a variety of specializations and career paths. The described study focused on psychological traits which relate to a solo career (performing individually or as a leader) or performing as part of a chamber ensemble, ensemble, choir, or orchestra. The hypothesis predicted that narcissism and self-efficacy would be higher in musicians performing solo. The study involved 124 professional musicians: instrumentalists and soloists, singers (n = 59), and ensemble instrumentalists and singers (n = 65). The results confirmed the hypothesis and showed that soloists were higher on self-efficacy and narcissism. In particular, soloists were higher on leader characteristics, demand for admiration, and vanity than musicians performing in ensembles. The result of these studies is a good introduction to a broader project answering the questions of what can increase or decrease the musician's sense of self-efficacy and whether the decreased self-efficacy could induce musicians to give up their solo careers.

Keywords: self-efficacy, musicians, musical profession, narcissism, soloists

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Authors: Sahiti Ganduri, Kavya Sreenivasan, Venya Lankala

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The narcissistic personality is a condition that causes individuals to have an inflated perception of self, giving themselves higher self-importance. It is necessary and interesting to study narcissistic traits in students of different majors. This can be a crucial environmental or psychosocial marker/indicator of narcissism which can also be of substantial importance in the field of education. This study focuses on identifying narcissism in students of psychology background. The narcissistic personality inventory was administered to 114 psychology students of different universities (public and private) in India. The results of our study provided evidence of the fact that narcissistic traits are higher in male psychology students as compared to female psychology students. Further, this paper has provided evidence that narcissistic traits are higher in leaders as compared to non-leaders.

Keywords: college students, disorder, gender, leadership, narcissistic personality, personality, students, traits

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Authors: Noelene Rose

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The DSM has been plagued with conceptual issues since its inception, not least discriminant validity and comorbidity issues. An attempt to remain a-theoretical in the divide between the psycho-dynamicists and the behaviourists contributed to much of this, in particular relating to the Personality Disorders. With the DSM-5, although the criterion have remained unchanged, major conceptual and structural directions have been flagged and proposed in section III. The biggest changes concern the Personality Disorders. While Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) was initially tagged for removal, instead the addition of section III proposes a move away from a categorical approach to a more dimensional approach, with a measure of Global Function of Personality. This global measure is an assessment of impairment of self-other relations; a measure of trait narcissism. In the same way mainstream psychology has struggled in its diagnosis of narcissism, so too in its treatment. Kohut’s self psychology represents the most significant inroad in theory and treatment for the narcissistic disorders. Kohut had moved away from a categorical system, towards disorders of the self. According to this theory, disorders of the self are the result of childhood trauma (impaired attunement) resulting in a developmental arrest. Self-psychological, Psychodynamic treatment of narcissism, however, is expensive, in time and money and outside the awareness or access of most people. There is more than a suggestion that narcissism is on the increase, created in trauma and worsened by a fearful world climate. A dimensional model of narcissism, from mild to severe, requires cut off points for diagnosis. But where do we draw the line? Mainstream psychology is inclined to set it high when there is some degree of impairment in functioning in daily life. Transpersonal Psychology is inclined to set it low, with the concept that we all have some degree of narcissism and that it is the point and the path of our life journey to transcend our focus on our selves. Mainstream psychology stops its focus on trait narcissism with a healthy level of self esteem, but it is at this point that Transpersonal Psychology can complement the discussion. From a Transpersonal point of view, failure to begin the process of self-transcendence will also create emotional symptoms of meaning or purpose, often later in our lives, and is also conceived of as a developmental arrest. The maps for this transcendence are hidden in plain sight; in the chakras of kundalini yoga, in the sacraments of the Catholic Church, in the Kabbalah tree of life of Judaism, in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, to name a few. This paper outlines some proposed research exploring the use of daily practices that can be incorporated into the therapy room; practices that utilise meditation, visualisation and imagination: that are informed by spiritual technology and guided by the psychodynamic theory of Self Psychology.

Keywords: narcissism, self-psychology, self-practice, self-transcendence

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Authors: Alida Sandison, Louise A. Stroud

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Narcissism is a personality configuration which has both normal and pathological personality expressions. Narcissism is highly complex, and is linked to a broad field of research. There are both dimensional and categorical conceptualisations of narcissism, and a variety of theoretical formulations that have been put forward to understand the narcissistic personality configuration. Currently, Kernberg’s Object Relations theory is well supported for this purpose. The complexity and particular defense mechanisms at play in the narcissistic personality make it a difficult personality configuration worth further research. Psychobiography as a methodology allows for the exploration of the lived life, and is thus a useful methodology to surmount these inherent challenges. Narcissism has been a focus of academic interest for a long time, and although there is a lot of research done in this area, to the researchers' knowledge, narcissistic dynamics have never been explored within a psychobiographical format. Thus, the primary aim of the research was to explore and describe narcissism in the life of Howard Hughes, with the objective of gaining further insight into narcissism through the use of this unconventional research approach. Hughes was chosen as subject for the study as he is renowned as an eccentric billionaire who had his revolutionary effect on the world, but was concurrently disturbed within his personal pathologies. Hughes was dynamic in three different sectors, namely motion pictures, aviation and gambling. He became more and more reclusive as he entered into middle age. From his early fifties he was agoraphobic, and the social network of connectivity that could reasonably be expected from someone in the top of their field was notably distorted. Due to his strong narcissistic personality configuration, and the interpersonal difficulties he experienced, Hughes represents an ideal figure to explore narcissism. The study used a single case study design, and purposive sampling to select Hughes. Qualitative data was sampled, using secondary data sources. Given that Hughes was a famous figure, there is a plethora of information on his life, which is primarily autobiographical. This includes books written about his life, and archival material in the form of newspaper articles, interviews and movies. Gathered data were triangulated to avoid the effect of author bias, and increase the credibility of the data used. It was collected using Yin’s guidelines for data collection. Data was analysed using Miles and Huberman strategy of data analysis, which consists of three steps, namely, data reduction, data display, and conclusion drawing and verification. Patterns which emerged in the data highlighted the defense mechanisms used by Hughes, in particular that of splitting and projection, in defending his sense of self. These defense mechanisms help us to understand the high levels of entitlement and paranoia experienced by Hughes. Findings provide further insight into his sense of isolation and difference, and the consequent difficulty he experienced in maintaining connections with others. Findings furthermore confirm the effectiveness of Kernberg’s theory in understanding narcissism observing an individual life.

Keywords: Howard Hughes, narcissism, narcissistic defenses, object relations

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Authors: Mary Heather Lee T. Walker, Audilon Benjamin Madamba, Mizheal Vstrechnny Vidal, Rogelio Angeles, John Rhey Banag, Lorraine Martin

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Criminology students are the future police officers of the country that plays a major role in protecting the citizens. Their behavior must be thoroughly assessed before given a badge of responsibility. Therefore, it is important to highlight their Dark Triad that is composed of Machiavellianism, Narcissism, and Psychopathy which are considered to be controversial variables in the present while self-restraint is considered to be their way of controlling themselves especially in their line of work. The researchers used convenience and random sampling and found the respondents from a private school. Thus, the study’s aim is to determine whether there is a relationship among these variables. Machiavellianism and Psychopathy is linked to Self-Restraint except Narcissism. There are lots of factors that resulted into this.

Keywords: criminology, dark triad, self-restraint, students

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Authors: Emma Garcia-Meca, Jennifer Martinez-Ferrero, Camino Ramon Llorens

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This paper provides insights into how narcissistic Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) influence the presence of women in top management teams (TMT). We also study whether a CEO's power and gender and the gender diversity of the firm's board moderate the relationship between CEO narcissism and TMT gender diversity. Our results reveal that narcissistic CEOs are less likely to support women in TMTs, confirming that CEO personality traits influence team structure. Further results suggest that this aversion increases as the CEO's power grows when female representation on boards decreases and when the CEO is a woman. This paper integrates theories that use the social psychology and upper echelon theories, offering a greater understanding of how CEO personality traits influence the structure of firms. We also contribute to the knowledge about how different governance characteristics can moderate the influence of narcissistic CEOs on women in TMTs, highlighting the relevance of governance traits that increase the effect of narcissism. The results demonstrate different female behavior toward promoting TMT gender equality depending on the specific position of women in the firm's hierarchy and their psychological attributes. We find that women directors support social identity values, and narcissistic female CEOs act like queen bees.

Keywords: gender diversity, board, corporate governance, female CEO, management

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Authors: Muhammad Sheeraz, Mehwish Ejaz

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This study endeavors to enhance the understanding of the determinants of oppositional brand loyalty, particularly within the context of fans of a sports brand. The primary focus is on investigating how oppositional brand loyalty fosters rivalry among the fans and exploring the interplay between various variables, namely self-congruence, consumer brand identification, consumer brand engagement, and narcissism, in influencing the likelihood of endorsing a rival team. The research adopts a cross-sectional survey methodology, employing a structured questionnaire distributed both online and onsite to gather responses from a representative sample of 460 PSL fans in Pakistan. The data collection process involved obtaining responses from diverse settings, including universities, shopping malls, and other public spaces frequented by PSL enthusiasts. Participants were prompted to indicate their allegiance to a specific PSL team and subsequently respond to the questionnaire based on their preferences. The findings of the study reveal that narcissism, as a moderating factor, exhibits no significant influence on consumer brand identification, consumer brand engagement, and oppositional brand loyalty. However, it does emerge as a significant moderator in the relationship between self-congruence and consumer brand identification. Particularly, consumers express brand identification through self-congruence, elucidating the existence of oppositional sentiments among PSL fans and their counterparts supporting rival teams. The implications of these results underscore the importance for marketers to establish a brand identity that resonates with consumers on a personal level. Such an approach fosters a strong sense of identification with the brand, prompting consumers to vigorously defend and support their favored brands, even in the face of opposition from rival teams. Marketers are encouraged to focus on cultivating long-term consumer loyalty, as it proves pivotal in maintaining a competitive advantage over industry counterparts.

Keywords: oppositional brand loyalty, consumer brand identification, consumer brand engagement, narcissism, self-congruence

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Authors: Jasmine H. Gagnon

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The present study examined how grandiose narcissists make adaptive trade-offs between mating investment, parenting investment, and somatic investment relative to individuals without narcissistic personalities. A sample of 509 males and females between the ages of 24 and 35 years old (49.31% female) completed a personality inventory assessing Honesty-Humility, Emotionality, Extraversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, and Openness to Experience. In a Latent Profile Analysis (LPA), personality inventory scores were used to classify participants into latent groups. The model of best fit identified one grandiose narcissist group and three groups with non-narcissistic personalities. Covariate analyses revealed that individuals with narcissistic traits made significantly more significant somatic investments in comparison to two of the three non-narcissistic latent groups. No other significant differences between the narcissistic and non-pathological groups were found. Thus, grandiose narcissists trade off parenting and mating investments to make more significant somatic investments. That is, they expend a larger portion of their energetic resources on maintaining their physical health and careers and similar quantities of energetic resources on maintaining relationships with their offspring and potential romantic partners as individuals without narcissistic personalities.

Keywords: narcissism, grandiose narcissism, HEXACO, trade-offs, mating, parenting, somatic, dark triad

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Authors: Eitan Elaad, Yeela Gal-Gonen

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Two studies examined gender differences in lying when the truth-telling bias prevailed and when inspiring lying and distrust. The first study used 156 participants from the community (78 pairs). First, participants completed the Narcissistic Personality Inventory, the Lie- and Truth Ability Assessment Scale (LTAAS), and the Rational-Experiential Inventory. Then, they participated in a deception game where they performed as senders and receivers of true and false communications. Their goal was to retain as many points as possible according to a payoff matrix that specified the reward they would gain for any possible outcome. Results indicated that males in the sender position lied more and were more successful tellers of lies and truths than females. On the other hand, males, as receivers, trusted less than females but were not better at detecting lies and truths. We explained the results by a. Male's high perceived lie-telling ability. We observed that confidence in telling lies guided participants to increase their use of lies. Male's lie-telling confidence corresponded to earlier accounts that showed a consistent association between high self-assessed lying ability, reports of frequent lying, and predictions of actual lying in experimental settings; b. Male's narcissistic features. Earlier accounts described positive relations between narcissism and reported lying or unethical behavior in everyday life situations. Predictions about the association between narcissism and frequent lying received support in the present study. Furthermore, males scored higher than females on the narcissism scale; and c. Male's experiential thinking style. We observed that males scored higher than females on the experiential thinking style scale. We further hypothesized that the experiential thinking style predicts frequent lying in the deception game. Results confirmed the hypothesis. The second study used one hundred volunteers (40 females) who underwent the same procedure. However, the payoff matrix encouraged lying and distrust. Results showed that male participants lied more than females. We found no gender differences in trust. Males and females did not differ in their success of telling and detecting lies and truths. Participants also completed the LTAAS questionnaire. Males assessed their lie-telling ability higher than females, but the ability assessment did not predict lying frequency. A final note. The present design is limited to low stakes. Participants knew that they were participating in a game, and they would not experience any consequences from their deception in the game. Therefore, we advise caution when applying the present results to lying under high stakes.

Keywords: gender, lying, detection of deception, information processing style, self-assessed lying ability

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Authors: Leena-Maria Alyedreessy

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Self-esteem is thought to be determined by ones’ own feeling of being included, liked and accepted by others. This research explores whether this concept may also be applied in the virtual world and assesses whether there is any relationship between Twitter users' self-esteem and the amount of interactions they receive. 20 female Arab participants were given a survey asking them about their Twitter interactions and their feelings of having an imagined audience to fill out and a Rosenberg Self-Esteem Assessment to complete. After completion and statistical analysis, results showed a significant correlation between the feeling of being Twitter elite, the feeling of having a lot of people listening to your tweets and having a lot of interactions with high self-esteem. However, no correlations were detected for low-self-esteem and low interactions.

Keywords: twitter, social media, self-esteem, narcissism, interactions

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Authors: Rui Xing, Xiaowen Zhao, Hao Huang, Chang Liu

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Creativity is regarded as vital for new ventures' development since the whole process of entrepreneurship is rooted in the creation and exploration of new ideas. The entrepreneurial leader is central to the entrepreneurial team, who plays an especially important role in this process. However, few scholars have studied the impact entrepreneurs' leadership styles on the creativity of entrepreneurial teams. In this study, we integrate the historically disjointed literatures of leadership style and team creativity under entrepreneurship circumstance to understand why and when entrepreneurs' different leadership style relates to team creativity. Focus on answering the following questions: Is humility leadership necessarily better than narcissism leadership at increasing the creativity of entrepreneurial teams? Moreover, in which situations humility leadership or narcissism leadership is more conducive to the entrepreneurial team's creativity? Based on the componential theory of creativity and entrepreneurial cognition theory, we explore the relationship between entrepreneurs' leadership style and team creativity, treating team cognitive diversity and environmental uncertainty as moderators and psychological empowerment as mediators. We tested our hypotheses using data gathered from 64 teams and 256 individual members from 53 new firms in China's first-tier cities such as Beijing and Shanghai. We found that there was a significant positive relation between entrepreneurs' humble leadership and psychological empowerment, and the more significant the positive correlation was when the environmental uncertainty was high. In addition, there was a significant negative relation between entrepreneurs' narcissistic leadership and psychological empowerment, and the negative relation was weaker in teams with a high team cognitive diversity value. Furthermore, both entrepreneurs' humble leadership and team psychological empowerment were significantly positively related to team creativity. While entrepreneurs' narcissistic leadership was negatively related to team creativity, and the negative relationship was weaker in teams with a high team cognitive diversity or a high environmental uncertainty value. This study has some implications for both scholars and entrepreneurs. Firstly, our study enriches the understanding of the role of leadership in entrepreneurial team creativity. Different from previous team creativity literatures, focusing on TMT and R&D team, this study is a significant attempt to demonstrate that entrepreneurial leadership style is particularly relevant to the core requirements of team creativity. Secondly, this study introduces two moderating variables, cognitive diversity and environmental uncertainty, to explore the different boundary conditions under which the two leadership styles play their roles, which is helpful for entrepreneurs to understand how to leverage leadership to improve entrepreneurial team creativity, how to recruit cognitively diverse employees to moderate the effects of inappropriate leadership to the team. Finally, our findings showed that entrepreneurs' humble leadership makes a unique contribution to explaining team creativity through team psychological empowerment.

Keywords: entrepreneurs’ leadership style, entrepreneurial team creativity, team psychological empowerment, team cognitive diversity, environmental uncertainty

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Authors: Megan E. Davies

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With the intention of identifying cognitive processes uniquely involved in the dark triad personality traits of psychopathy, Machiavellianism, and narcissism, this study aimed to determine further potential differences and parameters of individual traits by explaining a statistically significant amount of variance between the constructs of manipulativeness, impulsiveness, grit, and need for cognition within the dark triad. Applying a cross-sectional design, N = 96 participants self-reported using the MACH-IV, SRP-III, NFC-S, and Grit Scale for Perseverance and Passion for Long-Term Goals. Hierarchical regression analyses showed that only manipulativeness predicted Machiavellianism, whereas manipulativeness and impulsiveness were found to have predictive qualities for psychopathy. Overall, these results found areas of discrepancy and overlap between manipulation and impulsivity regarding psychopathy and Machiavellianism. Additionally, this study serves to preliminarily eliminate the Need for Cognition and grit as predictive variables for Machiavellianism and psychopathy.

Keywords: Machiavellianism, psychopathy, manipulation, impulsiveness, need for cognition, grit, dark triad

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Authors: Junali Deka

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“Pictures speak more than a thousand words”. It is the power of image which can have multiple meanings the way it is read by the viewers. This research article is an outcome of the extensive study of the phenomenon of‘selfie culture’ and dire need of self-constructed virtual identity among youths. In the recent times, there has been a revolutionary change in the concept of photography in terms of both techniques and applications. The popularity of ‘self-portraits’ mainly depend on the temporal space and time created on social networking sites like Facebook, Instagram. With reference to Stuart’s Hall encoding and decoding process, the article studies the behavior of the users who post photographs online. The photographic messages (Roland Barthes) are interpreted differently by different viewers. The notion of ‘self’, ‘self-love and practice of looking (Marita Sturken) and ways of seeing (John Berger) got new definition and dimensional together. After Oscars Night, show host Ellen DeGeneres’s selfie created the most buzz and hype in the social media. The term was judged the word of 2013, and has earned its place in the dictionary. “In November 2013, the word "selfie" was announced as being the "word of the year" by the Oxford English Dictionary. By the end of 2012, Time magazine considered selfie one of the "top 10 buzzwords" of that year; although selfies had existed long before, it was in 2012 that the term "really hit the big time an Australian origin. The present study was carried to understand the concept of ‘selfie-bug’ and the phenomenon it has created among youth (especially students) at large in developing a pseudo-image of its own. The topic was relevant and gave a platform to discuss about the cultural, psychological and sociological implications of selfie in the age of digital technology. At the first level, content analysis of the primary and secondary sources including newspapers articles and online resources was carried out followed by a small online survey conducted with the help of questionnaire to find out the student’s view on selfie and its social and psychological effects. The newspapers reports and online resources confirmed that selfie is a new trend in the digital media and it has redefined the notion of beauty and self-love. The Facebook and Instagram are the major platforms used to express one-self and creation of virtual identity. The findings clearly reflected the active participation of female students in comparison to male students. The study of the photographs of few selected respondents revealed the difference of attitude and image building among male and female users. The study underlines some basic questions about the desire of reconstruction of identity among young generation, such as - are they becoming culturally narcissist; responsible factors for cultural, social and moral changes in the society, psychological and technological effects caused by Smartphone as well, culminating into a big question mark whether the selfie is a social signifier of identity construction.

Keywords: Culture, Narcissist, Photographs, Selfie

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Authors: Z. Xu

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Immersive virtual reality (VR) has gained momentum in humanitarian communication due to its utopian promises of co-presence, immediacy, and transcendence. These potential benefits have led the United Nations (UN) to tirelessly produce and distribute VR series to evoke global empathy and encourage policymakers, philanthropic business tycoons and citizens around the world to actually do something (i.e. give a donation). However, it is unclear whether or not VR can cultivate cosmopolitans with a sense of social responsibility towards the geographically, socially/culturally and morally mediated misfortune of faraway others. Drawing upon existing works on the mediation of distant suffering, this article constructs an analytical framework to articulate the issue. Applying this framework on a case study of five of the UN’s VR pieces, the article identifies three paradoxes that exist between cyber-utopian and cyber-dystopian narratives. In the “paradox of distance”, VR relies on the notions of “presence” and “storyliving” to implicitly link audiences spatially and temporally to distant suffering, creating global connectivity and reducing perceived distances between audiences and others; yet it also enables audiences to fully occupy the point of view of distant sufferers (creating too close/absolute proximity), which may cause them to feel naive self-righteousness or narcissism with their pleasures and desire, thereby destroying the “proper distance”. In the “paradox of agency”, VR simulates a superficially “real” encounter for visual intimacy, thereby establishing an “audiences–beneficiary” relationship in humanitarian communication; yet in this case the mediated hyperreality is not an authentic reality, and its simulation does not fill the gap between reality and the virtual world. In the “paradox of the hierarchies of human life”, VR enables an audience to experience virtually fundamental “freedom”, epitomizing an attitude of cultural relativism that informs a great deal of contemporary multiculturalism, providing vast possibilities for a more egalitarian representation of distant sufferers; yet it also takes the spectator’s personally empathic feelings as the focus of intervention, rather than structural inequality and political exclusion (an economic and political power relations of viewing). Thus, the audience can potentially remain trapped within the minefield of hegemonic humanitarianism. This study is significant in two respects. First, it advances the turn of digitalization in studies of media and morality in the polymedia milieu; it is motivated by the necessary call for a move beyond traditional technological environments to arrive at a more novel understanding of the asymmetry of power between the safety of spectators and the vulnerability of mediated sufferers. Second, it not only reminds humanitarian journalists and NGOs that they should not rely entirely on the richer news experience or powerful response-ability enabled by VR to gain a “moral bond” with distant sufferers, but also argues that when fully-fledged VR technology is developed, it can serve as a kind of alchemy and should not be underestimated merely as a “bugaboo” of an alarmist philosophical and fictional dystopia.

Keywords: audience, cosmopolitan, distant suffering, virtual reality, humanitarian communication

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