The dangers that lurk in the saliva of narcissistic men

Are you a guy who sneaks a peek at yourself as you pass a reflective store front? Do you stare at your own Facebook profile more than you look at other people’s? Are you always thinking of better versions of your friends’ jokes that you would have told?

You, sir, are a narcissist, but you better watch out! New research shows narcissism might actually be bad for your health — in the form of toxic drool that so often spills from your mouth whilst thinking of yourself!

According to Live Science, researchers interviewed 106 young men and women, asking them all kinds of questions about how they perceive themselves. Then the researchers split their traits in two different categories: Unhealthy narcissism (“entitlement and exploitativeness”) and healthy narcissism (“authority, superiority, vanity and self-sufficiency).

They found young men who have more unhealthy narcissism to produce higher levels of cortisol, a stress-related hormone, in their saliva. That could indicate that narcissists (the unhealthy kind) could be more prone to stress-related health issues like cardiovascular problems.  

“Even though narcissists have grandiose self-perceptions, they also have fragile views of themselves, and often resort to defensive strategies like aggression when their sense of superiority is threatened,” said study researcher David Reinhard.

“These kinds of coping strategies are linked with increased cardiovascular reactivity to stress and higher blood pressure, so it makes sense that higher levels of maladaptive narcissism would contribute to highly reactive stress response systems and chronically elevated levels of stress.”

“See? It’s not easy to look this good. People don’t even know the stress we have to deal with,” said narcissists everywhere upon hearing the news.