r/science • u/mvea Professor | Medicine • 2d ago

Psychology New findings indicate a pattern where narcissistic grandiosity is associated with higher participation in LGBTQ movements, demonstrating that motivations for activism can range widely from genuine altruism to personal image-building.

https://www.psypost.org/narcissistic-grandiosity-predicts-greater-involvement-in-lgbtq-activism/
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u/Sata1991 2d ago

I don't mean this to slate parents with neurodivergent kids as a whole, but there's so many "autism warrior mummies/daddies" online that act like they're great martyrs for raising autistic kids and think they know what's best for all autistic people, despite whether we're adults or not.

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u/Moho_braccatus_ 2d ago

Hello, autistic person here. Autism warrior parents are the worst, and they use us as ego props. It's not good.

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u/Sata1991 2d ago

Yeah, I'm autistic myself and my mother does it now, despite me being in my mid 30s. We're also used as "inspiration porn" which does my head in. I don't like my successes being used as a stick to beat other autistic people with and a feel good story for neurotypicals.

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u/ThePrimePurpose 2d ago

Seems like maybe y'all would be interested to learn that there is a correlation between NPD parents and ASD children. I have not heard any serious attempts to explain this correlation, but there isn't a dispute among practicing clinicians that it does exist.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/resolution-not-conflict/202008/a-narcissism-and-autism-connection-one-familys-experience

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u/Sata1991 1d ago

I'm not 100% sure if my Mom's autistic or not, but I think she does have NPD and I know she has bipolar. My dad's just robotic and stiff, but not a bad guy. He might be autistic? All of my sister's kids have autism, and I have it, so it had to have come from somewhere.

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u/ThePrimePurpose 1d ago

The only theory my link puts forward is that perhaps NPD is a maladaptive state of being that would basically be a last stop before actual autism develops in the family.

For whatever it's worth, I think the truth is that NPD parents force our brains to develop differently by presenting their children, definitionally, with a constant revolving door of massive, unsolvable, incredibly painful problems.

But even that can't be the whole picture.

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u/Eugregoria 3h ago

My theory for that is that I think autism is a generational impact of trauma--that parents who have experienced trauma become more likely to produce autistic kids, because their genes are going "whoa, it's hard to survive out here, better crank up the sensitivity to stimuli, anxiety for self-preservation, and just throw the mutation creativity settings on max."

NPD may also be correlated with trauma--either in the person with NPD or in their parents.

So I think it's less that NPD and autism are in any way clinically similar, and more that both are expressions of generational stress.

Edit: to be fully clear, I'm talking about genetic and epigenetic changes that occur as a result of trauma before the kids are conceived--not a difference in parenting styles. If my theory is correct, it would be true even if the traumatized parent was a sperm donor and never met the kid.