Young women who perceive their mothers to have highly self-centered traits are more likely to have difficulty maintaining their own emotional stability. These results suggest that a parent’s inability to demonstrate empathy may negatively impact how daughters learn to process emotions in early adulthood. The study was published in Frontiers in Psychology.
Narcissism involves a grandiose sense of self-importance combined with a constant desire for admiration. People with high narcissistic personalities tend to prioritize their own personal needs over the feelings of others. They often lack the ability to empathize with those around them. This creates a difficult environment within the family unit.
Narcissistic parents may view their children as simply an extension of themselves. They often have a hard time providing real emotional support or validating their child’s independent thoughts and feelings. Children raised in such environments often learn to suppress their emotions to avoid harsh criticism. They may learn early on that maintaining appearances is more important than dealing with real emotional distress.
Emotional balance describes a person’s ability to survive life’s inevitable stresses without falling into extreme mood states. Emotionally balanced people have the internal tools to calm down and respond constructively when faced with frustration. It allows you to maintain a sense of balance while assessing stressful situations. People who lack these skills are more susceptible to aggressive reactions and harmful behaviors when pressure is applied.
Researchers looked at emotional balance through the lenses of cognitive and behavioral psychology. From a cognitive perspective, negative emotions often result from distorted interpretations of reality. When you learn to replace these negative thoughts with realistic evaluations, you tend to have better control over your emotional reactions.
Behavioral theorists offer a similar perspective on how stress affects young people. They believe that emotional imbalance is the result of a person’s loss of control over his or her behavior when faced with external problems. Students facing academic pressure may resort to social isolation instead of seeking help, which can again lead to increased anxiety.
College is a major turning point in a young person’s life that tests their coping mechanisms. Students face intense academic demands, changing social dynamics, and impending pressures of independence. Failure to control emotions during this time can lead to academic failure and serious mental health difficulties.
Entesar al-Nashmi and Hanem M. Alborey of King Faisal University in Saudi Arabia sought to understand how family dynamics influence developmental outcomes. They wanted to see if the environment a student grew up in correlated with her current emotional coping skills. Arnashmi led the development of specific questionnaires used to measure these specific psychological dynamics.
Researchers recruited 416 female undergraduate students between the ages of 18 and 24. These participants were enrolled in various academic programs such as agriculture and business administration. The research team collected data over a three-month period using both electronic and paper surveys. Participants filled out a form anonymously asking them to answer honestly about their family life.
To measure family dynamics, researchers designed the Narcissistic Mother Scale. This tool asked students to rate their mothers on nine different behavioral dimensions. These categories include feelings of dominance, arrogance, superiority, excitement, and entitlement. Students rated statements based on whether the behavior applied occasionally or consistently to the mother.
The researchers also developed an emotional balance scale to assess students’ inner lives. This questionnaire measured both individual and social emotion regulation abilities. This question asked students about cognitive harmony, which refers to consistency between thoughts and beliefs. The tool also assessed how well participants could manage conflicting emotions during stressful moments.
Overall, most participants rated their mothers relatively low on the narcissism scale. The only exception was a trait the researchers named excitability, which was in the moderate range. The students’ overall emotional balance also independently averaged to a moderate level.
When researchers analyzed the combined data, they found predictable mathematical patterns. This analysis revealed a negative correlation between mothers’ perceptions of narcissism and their daughters’ emotional balance. Students who reported high levels of maternal narcissism tended to score lower on emotional balance, while students who reported low maternal narcissism had higher scores.
The researchers further analyzed the data to determine which specific maternal characteristics were the strongest indicators of psychological distress. They found that maternal intolerance was the strongest predictor of emotional imbalance in daughters. Exploitative behavior by the mother was the second strongest indicator.
The study authors connected these results with established psychological frameworks such as attachment theory. Children need a secure emotional bond with their primary caregiver in order to develop healthy social skills. If the mother is unable to provide a secure emotional base, the child may experience a form of emotional neglect. This invisible neglect can leave a feeling of emotional isolation that lasts into adulthood.
Children in narcissistic families may also develop maladaptive defense mechanisms to survive the family environment. Some psychologists suggest that these children are never taught to set healthy boundaries. They grow up prioritizing their parents’ needs in order to gain basic approval and avoid conflict. As adults, this childhood conditioning leads to an inability to express one’s needs or effectively process negative emotions.
The current study relies entirely on daughters’ subjective perceptions of their mothers. Researchers did not perform a clinical psychiatric evaluation of the mother to confirm the diagnosis of narcissistic personality disorder. Because the study design is correlational, it cannot be conclusively proven that maternal characteristics directly cause emotional conflict in daughters. The sample is limited to a specific demographic: female students from a single university.
To build on this basic research, researchers recommend developing targeted intervention programs. They believe universities can provide counseling aimed at reducing the impact of difficult family relationships on young women. Future research could also compare the emotional balance of daughters raised by highly narcissistic mothers to that of typical mothers.
Additional research could investigate how maternal narcissism is related to other psychological variables in youth. The authors hope that their research will raise awareness among parents about their fundamental role in promoting healthy emotional development. Providing a supportive and empathetic environment at home appears to give children a better chance of surviving the stresses of adult life.
The study, titled “The relationship between mothers’ narcissistic personality as perceived by daughters and the emotional balance of female students at King Faisal University,” was authored by Entesar Al-Nashmi and Hanem M. Alborey.
