Tuesday, January 26, 2021

Study Finds Many Spiritual Practices Boost Narcissism and Feelings of Superiority

 
Study: “An Exploration of Spiritual Superiority: The Paradox of Self‐Enhancement“ 
Authors: Roos Vonk and Anouk Visser
Published in: European Journal of Social Psychology
Publication date: October 1, 2020

A new study has found that some popular forms of spiritual training — such as energy healing, aura reading, and, to a lesser degree, mindfulness and meditation — correlate with both narcissism and “spiritual superiority.”

An implicit feature of spiritual training is that it allows its adherents to distance themselves from their egos, and thereby from things such as the need for social approval or success. By encouraging self-compassion and non-judgmental self-acceptance, spiritual training should presumably make people less concerned with such things.