Narcissistic Personality Disorders: Video Analysis

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Throughout the following YouTube videos, individuals were shown to possess extremely inaccurate and distorted images of themselves. In order to examine the origin of these behaviors, the idea and development of one’s self-esteem must be considered. Self-esteem is essentially an individual's belief and sense of worth towards themselves. This idea can be heavily influenced by the individual's environment as well as other social factors. If an individual contains too much self-esteem, like the performers shown on American Idol, than they are in danger of developing a narcissistic personality disorder. Narcissistic personality disorder is reflected through a pattern of exaggeration over one's abilities, a constant need for attention and an expectation …show more content…

Here, Rhonetta is expressing an extremely bold opinion about herself and her potential. Additionally, she is attempting to create an image for herself by associating herself with people of high status. She follows this statement up by telling Ryan Seacrest that she will “probably be at the top.” Once listening to the feedback on her performance, she is completely shocked. Here, another parallel can be drawn between Rhonetta and individuals who contain narcissistic personality disorder. Individuals who suffer from this disorder tend to seek out constant attention and praise from others. This makes them very sensitive towards criticism from others, as they almost feel attacked and targeted. When Rhonetta experiences a lack of positive reinforcement, meaning she was not presented with any reward or stimulus in order to enhance a desired behavior, she lashes out at the judges. In addition, she tells the judges it's their loss and that “they turned down a superstar.” Overall, the disparities found between Rhonetta’s actions and her beliefs could be explained through the narcissistic personality …show more content…

An optimism bias is the idea that you are more likely to experience forms of success, while your peers will experience forms of misfortune. This highly irrational expectation for your life, then promotes risky behavior and bad decision-making. Having high levels of optimism causes individuals to pursue their goals more frequently and have high self-esteem. During the video, Rhonetta stated that if Paula and her walked out of the studio people would automatically think that she was the famous one. This strong sense of optimism and belief in her ability, causes her to make poor decisions like entering American Idol and bashing the judges on live TV. Here, she is focused on herself and refuses to see the realistic comparison of her abilities to others. Additionally, she is constantly comparing herself to her peers and presenting the idea that they would have no chance against her. In this situation, she is so confident on her future that she fails to recognize that another individual could possess a greater skill set. Although in some cases the optimism bias can further lead to the self-fulfilling prophecy, the idea that people are more successful if they believe they will be successful, Rhonetta still walked away empty handed. Overall, Rhonetta’s actions on American Idol can be explained through the presence of a narcissistic personality disorder, an attentional bias or an optimism

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