Selfishness: How Being Rich Increases Narcissism

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The rich really are different — and, apparently more self-absorbed, according to the latest research.

That goes against the conventional wisdom that the more people have, the more they appreciate their obligations to give back to others. Recent studies show, for example, that wealthier people are more likely to cut people off in traffic and to behave unethically in simulated business and charity scenarios. Earlier this year, statistics on charitable giving revealed that while the wealthy donate about 1.3% of their income to charity, the poorest actually give more than twice as much as a proportion of their earnings — 3.2%.

In five different experiments involving several hundred undergraduates and 100 adults recruited from online communities.  The researchers found higher levels of both narcissism and entitlement among those of higher income and social class.