TY - JOUR
T1 - Measurement Invariance of Three Narcissism Questionnaires Across the United States, the United Kingdom, and Germany
AU - Wetzel, Eunike
AU - Lang, Felix J.
AU - Back, Mitja D.
AU - Vecchione, Michele
AU - Rogoza, Radoslaw
AU - Roberts, Brent W.
N1 - Funding Information:
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This research was supported by a grant from the Mentoring Program of the Zukunftskolleg at the University of Konstanz awarded to Eunike Wetzel and a grant from the National Science Center Poland awarded to Radoslaw Rogoza (2014/14/M/HS6/00919).
PY - 2021/1
Y1 - 2021/1
N2 - With a recent surge of research on narcissism, narcissism questionnaires are increasingly being translated and applied in various countries. The measurement invariance of an instrument across countries is a precondition for being able to compare scores across countries. We investigated the cross-cultural measurement invariance of three narcissism questionnaires (Brief Pathological Narcissism Inventory [B-PNI], Narcissistic Personality Inventory [NPI], and Narcissistic Admiration and Rivalry Questionnaire [NARQ]) and mean-level differences across samples from the United States (N = 2,464), the United Kingdom (N = 307), and Germany (N = 925). Overall, the B-PNI and NARQ functioned equivalently for the U.S. and U.K. participants. More violations of measurement invariance were found between Germany and the combined U.S. and U.K. samples, and for the NPI. In the B-PNI and NARQ, Americans scored higher than individuals from the United Kingdom regarding agentic aspects (self-sacrificing self-enhancement, admiration), while Germans scored lower than both Americans and U.K. individuals regarding antagonistic (entitlement rage, rivalry) and neurotic (hiding the self, contingent self-esteem) aspects. More inconsistent results were found for NPI facets. When noninvariance was present, observed means yielded biased results. Thus, the degree of measurement invariance across translated instrument versions should be considered in cross-cultural comparisons, even with culturally similar countries.
AB - With a recent surge of research on narcissism, narcissism questionnaires are increasingly being translated and applied in various countries. The measurement invariance of an instrument across countries is a precondition for being able to compare scores across countries. We investigated the cross-cultural measurement invariance of three narcissism questionnaires (Brief Pathological Narcissism Inventory [B-PNI], Narcissistic Personality Inventory [NPI], and Narcissistic Admiration and Rivalry Questionnaire [NARQ]) and mean-level differences across samples from the United States (N = 2,464), the United Kingdom (N = 307), and Germany (N = 925). Overall, the B-PNI and NARQ functioned equivalently for the U.S. and U.K. participants. More violations of measurement invariance were found between Germany and the combined U.S. and U.K. samples, and for the NPI. In the B-PNI and NARQ, Americans scored higher than individuals from the United Kingdom regarding agentic aspects (self-sacrificing self-enhancement, admiration), while Germans scored lower than both Americans and U.K. individuals regarding antagonistic (entitlement rage, rivalry) and neurotic (hiding the self, contingent self-esteem) aspects. More inconsistent results were found for NPI facets. When noninvariance was present, observed means yielded biased results. Thus, the degree of measurement invariance across translated instrument versions should be considered in cross-cultural comparisons, even with culturally similar countries.
KW - Brief Pathological Narcissism Inventory
KW - Narcissistic Admiration and Rivalry Questionnaire
KW - Narcissistic Personality Inventory
KW - cross-cultural differences
KW - measurement equivalence
KW - measurement invariance
KW - narcissism
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U2 - 10.1177/1073191120907967
DO - 10.1177/1073191120907967
M3 - Article
C2 - 32370541
AN - SCOPUS:85084554227
VL - 28
SP - 29
EP - 43
JO - Assessment
JF - Assessment
SN - 1073-1911
IS - 1
ER -