2008 Woodie Awards
Letter to the Editor
Sharon Carnahan
Issue date: 3/12/07 Section: Opinions
- Page 1 of 1
Are today's children more narcissistic?
The Sandspur (3/5/07,p.4.) reports that they are. Do Rollins College students have an
inflated sense of their own abilities? That, I believe, is a function of their life experiences.
In the real world, people who have lived long do not always prosper. "What the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can
achieve" is not a new idea; in the bestseller Think and Grow Rich, Napoleon Hill (1937) stated that the mind can control all circumstances. Nonsense! Tell that to the people of New Orleans, or Rwanda.
However, our powerful minds and spirits give us a chance to interpret our circumstances in a positive or negative light, and to
choose our actions in response to difficult life experiences, according to the hope that is within us.
Who has hope? Consider this: at age 18, only about 50% of men and 75% of women in the U.S.
have even graduated from high school and the bo?? om 20% of U.S. families earn less than $20,000 per year.
Today's college students who score "above average" in narcissism represent a group of privileged children who have had access to resources the rest of the world can only dream about. And consistently positive life experiences can lead to an inflated sense of personal ability, relative to the rest of the world. This is a sense of internal locus of control, linked by researchers to a belief
in a just world where everybody (especially from MY neighborhood) gets what they deserve.
Does that mean that Mister Rogers and I should stop telling children that they are special? Bunk. Love brings hope. Our oft-quoted and beloved Rollins alumnus was seriously misrepresented in the Sentinel as a person whose writings promoted narcissism.
In fact, he championed an ethic of care for others, self sacrifice, kindness and truth, both in his popular TV shows and his personal
life. So pardon me if I continue to croon to my child each night: "You're special to me. You are the only one like you" (Fred M. Rogers, 1967).
Sharon Carnahan, Ph.D.
Professor of Psychology
The Sandspur (3/5/07,p.4.) reports that they are. Do Rollins College students have an
inflated sense of their own abilities? That, I believe, is a function of their life experiences.
In the real world, people who have lived long do not always prosper. "What the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can
achieve" is not a new idea; in the bestseller Think and Grow Rich, Napoleon Hill (1937) stated that the mind can control all circumstances. Nonsense! Tell that to the people of New Orleans, or Rwanda.
However, our powerful minds and spirits give us a chance to interpret our circumstances in a positive or negative light, and to
choose our actions in response to difficult life experiences, according to the hope that is within us.
Who has hope? Consider this: at age 18, only about 50% of men and 75% of women in the U.S.
have even graduated from high school and the bo?? om 20% of U.S. families earn less than $20,000 per year.
Today's college students who score "above average" in narcissism represent a group of privileged children who have had access to resources the rest of the world can only dream about. And consistently positive life experiences can lead to an inflated sense of personal ability, relative to the rest of the world. This is a sense of internal locus of control, linked by researchers to a belief
in a just world where everybody (especially from MY neighborhood) gets what they deserve.
Does that mean that Mister Rogers and I should stop telling children that they are special? Bunk. Love brings hope. Our oft-quoted and beloved Rollins alumnus was seriously misrepresented in the Sentinel as a person whose writings promoted narcissism.
In fact, he championed an ethic of care for others, self sacrifice, kindness and truth, both in his popular TV shows and his personal
life. So pardon me if I continue to croon to my child each night: "You're special to me. You are the only one like you" (Fred M. Rogers, 1967).
Sharon Carnahan, Ph.D.
Professor of Psychology
Be the first to comment on this story