Abstract
The present study examined differences in the relationships between narcissism and friendship, and between narcissism and intimacy, in the developmental transition from adolescence to early adulthood. It was hypothesized that there would be little difference in the relationship between narcissism and “trust for a friend” as an index of friendship, while narcissism would correlate more negatively with intimacy in an early adult sample than in an adolescent sample. Samples of 247 undergraduate and graduate students between the ages of 18-25 years (adolescents) and 352 adults between the ages of 26-35 years (young adults) completed a questionnaire which consisted of narcissism scales, a friendship scale, and an intimacy scale. The results of correlation analyses and tests for two correlation coefficients showed that there was no significant difference in the relationship between narcissism and “trust for a friend” between the two developmental stages, while multidimensional narcissistic indices for four dispositions (“need for attention and praise,” “narcissistic rage,” “narcissistic depression,” and “lack of empathy”) correlated more negatively with intimacy for the early adult sample than for the adolescent sample.
