Narcissism is one of those disorders that the public has taken to their hearts and calling someone a narcissist is a common insult to attack someone perceived as vain, egocentric or self-absorbed, however this does not reflect the full spectrum of the diagnosis. As with most things the public presses to their heart as the pejorative du jour, they failed to understand the full complexity of the disorder and the diagnostic criteria. Being a vain, self-centered bastard is part of the diagnosis, but is not the only thing required to be a narcissist, if it was most of us would qualify at one point or another.
Narcissism in the western culture is a growth industry [1] thus, the socio-cultural aspects of the diagnosis, is influenced. This follows from the BPS response to the DSM-V, where they write
The putative diagnoses presented in DSM-V are clearly based largely on social norms, with ‘symptoms’ that all rely on subjective judgements, with little confirmatory physical ‘signs’ or evidence of biological causation. The criteria are not value-free, but rather reflect current normative social expectations. Many researchers have pointed out that psychiatric diagnoses are plagued by problems ofreliability, validity, prognostic value, and co-morbidity. [3]