Being able to trust your partner to want the best for you forms the bedrock of a close relationship. No one wants a romantic partner who constantly engages in sabotage and deception. So what happens when people discover that their partner turns out to be doing just that?
Consider Betty and Francis, who started dating a year ago, having met online. Betty always felt that Francis was a bit on the overly competitive side, turning everything into a battle for victory. If Betty succeeded at work on some small achievement, Francis refused to take it seriously. Betty decided to stick it out because Francis seems to need her there and often relies on her for support. But warning signs like these are making her think that maybe she’d better get out while she still can.
The Path to Destruction With a Pathological Narcissist
As pointed out in a new study by Saint Camillus International University’s Guyonne Rogier and colleagues (2026), “trust appears to be one of the most desired features in a partner.” They key component of trust, they go on to note, is faith, or the confidence that a partner will remain caring and helpful regardless of what may happen in the future. It’s this uncertainty factor that could prove to be the hardest for narcissistic individuals to accept. But it’s not just any narcissistic individual; vulnerable narcissists should be particularly unhappy with the uncertainty factor. They don’t want to risk any possible rejection or disappointment from their partner.
Narcissism alone, even the vulnerable form, isn’t the only factor that can destroy faith and, hence, relationships. Rogier et al. point out that highly narcissistic people approach relationships from the two dimensions of admiration and rivalry. They are afraid of being outdone by their partner, because this would threaten their sense of worth. The activation of feelings of rivalry sets off the chain of reactions that ultimately leads faith to fall by the wayside.
Testing the Rivalry as the Destroyer of Relationships
The Italian authors tested this potential set of mechanisms by building a model that started with vulnerable narcissism as the origin of feelings of rivalry. In turn, rivalry toward the partner would lead, the model predicted, to the outcome of loss of faith in the romantic partner. Although this was a correlational study, the authors were able to test their model using controlled statistical modeling.
The online sample of more than 4,000 Italian adults (average age of 32 years) completed a set of standard personality questionnaires. Faith was measured with items such as “Even if I don’t know how my partner will react, I feel comfortable telling him/her anything about myself, even the things I am ashamed of” (reverse-scored). To measure vulnerable narcissism, the authors used the corresponding scale from the Narcissism Personality Inventory, with items such as “Sometimes I avoid people because I fear they will disappoint me.” Finally, rivalry was assessed with three subscales from the Narcissism Admiration and Rivalry Questionnaire (NARQ): Devaluation (“Other people are worth nothing”), Supremacy (“I want my rivals to fail”), and Aggressiveness (“I get annoyed when someone steals the attention from me”).
Consistent with the authors’ prediction, grandiose but not vulnerable narcissism predicted lack of faith in the partner. Grandiose narcissists may rival their partners, but they feel confident in how “magnificent and unique” they are, which should ensure their partner’s “love and devotion.” Vulnerable narcissists, anxiously attached to their partners, don’t have this same level of confidence in their ability. This leads the narcissistic rivalry to emerge, much as has happened to Betty and Francis.
Tracing the trajectory of relationships for people high in vulnerable narcissism from the study’s results reinforces this idea. In a good relationship, faith develops over time as the partners become less fearful of rejection even if they show their weak side. In relationships with vulnerable narcissists, rivalry builds over time. They start to devalue and distrust their partner the more they reveal their flaws and limitations. The rivalry becomes increasingly aggressive as a means of self-protection.
Stopping Rivalry’s Progressive Effects on Faith
If you’ve been in a situation like Betty’s, you can understand the push and pull that she might be experiencing. You can feel bad for a vulnerable narcissist whose precarious sense of self seems to need constant reinforcing. But when this person starts to attack you, this tries your patience. It can even make you start to question your own self-worth.
Pinpointing the problem in the maladaptive quality of narcissistic rivalry could provide you with important insights. The vulnerable narcissist may not “want” to be nasty, but may be unable to control the aggressive attempts to put you down. The flip side of rivalry is admiration. The grandiose narcissist may have too much of this feeling of self-satisfaction and superiority, but the vulnerable narcissist may need a bit more.
Narcissism Essential Reads
Returning to the primary purpose of the study, it can also be helpful to think about the faith dimension. A person high in vulnerable narcissism never feels certain of the future, which includes the certainty that a romantic partner will remain faithful. This can lead to endless worry but also endless attempts to win any battle for superiority.
To sum up, life with a pathological narcissist is never very pleasant. If you care about this person, though, understanding how rivalry breeds lack of faith can help you intervene before the dynamics take a toll on your relationship.
