The Factor Structure of the Narcissistic Personality Inventory

In the first study, we administered the 40-item Narcissistic Personality Inventory (NPI; Raskin & Terry, 1988) to 843 female and 843 male college students, most of whom were Euro-American, to comprehensively assess the NPI factor structure using confirmatory factor analysis. Initial exploratory common factor analyses (N = 724) revealed a 2-factor model (Leadership/Authority and Exhibitionism/Entitlement). Subsequently, we used confirmatory factor analysis in a separate sample (N = 724) to evaluate the Emmons (1987) 4-factor model, the Raskin and Terry (1988) 7-factor model, the Kubarych, Deary, and Austin (2004) 2- and 3-factor models, and our 2-factor model. Finally, we assessed construct validity by correlating the scale scores with the Five-factor model of personality in an independent sample (N = 238). The 2-factor models for the NPI we obtained in this study and by Kubarych et al. (2004) appeared to be the most parsimonious models, with both a good fit to the data and satisfactory internal consistency values; so they are recommended for use. However, additional NPI research is needed to rescale, modify, or omit several NPI items and develop gender-equivalent items.