Looking at the relationship between gender and narcissism, both genders displayed moderate significant relationships between narcissism and exercise addiction, with a stronger narcissistic relationship among males. This provides support for Kallippuska who indicated that male sports participants are more narcissistic than females. Moreover, this also lends support for previous findings by Brown, who indicated that males who participate in excessive bursts of exercise are more prone to narcissism. These conclusions also assist earlier research by indicating that groups of males that...
Looking at the relationship between gender and narcissism, both genders displayed moderate significant relationships between narcissism and exercise addiction, with a stronger narcissistic relationship among males. This provides support for Kallippuska who indicated that male sports participants are more narcissistic than females. Moreover, this also lends support for previous findings by Brown, who indicated that males who participate in excessive bursts of exercise are more prone to narcissism. These conclusions also assist earlier research by indicating that groups of males that engage in excessive exercise are more likely to be narcissistic as they strive to enhance their appearance. Therefore, high narcissism score reported by males could be related to muscularity. However, females too reported a significant positive relationship between narcissism and exercise addiction, thus supporting findings by Davis, Dionne & Shuster.
Group identity could have also played a significant role in the high narcissism levels reported by both males and females. Identifying with a group considered positive, for instance, a sports team may enhance one’s self-worth and self-esteem, which could have caused individuals to report high levels of narcissism. For these reasons, it is evident that high levels of narcissism and exercise addiction may classically exist in both genders. This could be due to the increased benefits related to exercise such as increased self-worth and appearance, which are both factors that a narcissist strives to satisfy. Therefore, individuals are likely to become addicted to exercise as they strive to meet their egotistic demands by exercising excessively.